


Tales from the Shadowed Abyss

by GhostandMiracle42



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Dark, Ancient magic, Are Awesome, Dark Harry Potter, Dark Multiverse, F/F, F/M, Goblins, Multi, Murder, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:22:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 45,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26947387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostandMiracle42/pseuds/GhostandMiracle42
Summary: Tales from the Shadowed Abyss, stories from the Dark Multiverse, that layer of reality where unstable worlds born of fear and nightmares are built and destroyed to fuel the power of the Great Destroyer, the reaper of all reality bound at the moment of creation.But those universes still have stories to tell. This is one of them.Harry Potter has tried to break Ginny Weasley out of Azkaban prison three times. This time, with the help of new ally Daphne Greengrass, he might just succeed.
Relationships: Daphne Greengrass/Ginny Weasley, Daphne Greengrass/Harry Potter, Daphne Greengrass/Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley
Comments: 50
Kudos: 63





	1. The Fourth Attempt

**_ Forward: _ **

**_For those of you who've never read any of our stories before; HI! I'm Miracle, and my husband is Ghost. Normally, we write these things together, but Ghost's mother is currently recovering from a difficult surgery so he's on the other side of the country taking care of his little sister. When the whole thing started, we decided to put our various ongoing fanfic projects on hold, and with our original novel currently undergoing beta-reading, I haven't had much to do on the writing front. So, when I've had the time, I've been plodding away at some solo things, and this is one of them._ **

**_This story represents a sort-of answer to one of the more common questions we got after Gemini Curse: what if the Ascended didn't interfere in the Chamber of Secrets incident and their world fell into the Dark Multiverse._ **

**_Now, you certainly don't need to have read that story for this to make sense, as I've removed most of the references to Gemini (with the exception of the Zodiac Runes). If anyone is a returning reader, consider this a tangentially connected AU story._ **

**_Now, enough talk from me. On with the story!_ **

* * *

# TALES OF THE SHADOWED ABYSS

Harry Potter was not one for sitting on his ass when shit needed doing.

He stood flat-footed on the island of Azkaban and took a long shuddering breath. This was the fourth time he'd stared up at the enormous and utterly depressing building, the faint and whisp like forms of hundreds of Dementors flying around the crumbling black structure. With any luck, it would be the last. His cloak caught the frigid and bitter wind of the North Sea, flaring out to the side, the flapping of the heavy cloth barely audible over the crashing waves behind him. The same gale was blowing his rat's nest of black hair as well. He supposed he would look quite the sight to any casual onlooker. In fact, come to think of it, the image he conjured in his head wasn't all that different to those Assassin games Dudley played on his consol. He might not have daggers strapped to his wrists, but he did have something a thousand times better.

Reaching into his cloak, he withdrew a short wand of pale willow wood, the hilt carved with thin lines. Harry wasn't sure if the markings were meant to be vines, cracks or lightning. The weapon had been incredibly damaged when he'd retrieved it from the wreckage of his parents' home in Godric's Hollow two months previously, less than three days after he'd returned from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry after the end of his fourth year. He'd cleaned it up as well as possible, but he still couldn't decide.

He gripped the wand tightly in his hand and felt the Thunderbird tail feather within his mother's wand stir slightly. The thing was bloody temperamental, and while it tolerated him, respected his skill and determination, it did _not_ like him.

He _would_ succeed this time. He swore it.

Three times he'd attempted to break into Azkaban prison since Ginny Weasley had been condemned to rot in the place after her first year. Three times he'd tried to rescue her. This time, the fourth time, he would get it right.

Because this time, he had help.

 _"Is it working?"_ Daphne's voice whispered, soft honey-like tones echoing through his right ear from the flat stone earing currently pierced there. The small river stone was very awkward and weighty, about the size of Harry's thumb. But it was definitely worth it. For the small rune etched into its surface, linked it to an identical stone currently being worn by Daphne Greengrass some five-hundred kilometres away. The Gemini Rune it was called, one of the twelve Zodiac Runes, the most powerful runic symbols known to the Wizarding World.

He'd spent the last month cramming everything he could about Ancient Runes into his brain, and with every fragment he learned, the more he wished he'd taken Runes instead of fucking Divination his third-year. Discovering that Lily Potter had been a protégé at the subject, and that Harry himself had seemingly inherited her skill with languages, had been the final kick to the balls.

"Yep. Everything is green. I'm going in."

_"Good luck."_

Clenching his teeth against the cold, and thanking whatever god was up there somewhere that it wasn't raining, he started the trek up the steep barren slopes of the island. Towards the prison tower.

The first time Harry had tried to free Ginny, he hadn't made it more than five steps before the power of the Dementors had forced him back the way he'd come. He'd been _so_ certain he could do it too. Sirius Black had managed it, after 12 years of imprisonment no less. Surely someone as skilled as Harry was, despite his age, could get in and get out with one witch who'd only been there for a few weeks? Boy had he been wrong. And that had been when half the Dementor force had already been moved _away_ from the prison to search for Sirius.

Now? Over two years and hours and hours of Patronus training latter, Dementors did jack shit to him. It was the Auror guard he had to worry about.

Fortunately, as he'd learned on his second attempt to infiltrate the island, the Aurors weren't looking for people trying to break into Azkaban. They were watching for people trying to get _out_. And even that was a stretch, as the oppressive and wretched atmosphere had the exact same effect on the Aurors as it did on the prisoners, which meant they weren't very attentive.

Regardless, Harry wasn't taking any chances. He pulled out his Invisibility Cloak as he neared the prison entrance and draped the silvery cloth over himself. He kept walking, making sure to take very shallow breaths until he reached the weathered stone wall. He cast a glance at the gates, bared by cold iron and guarded by two Dementors. Either he was far enough away that they didn't notice him, or the stench of fear from within the building was enough to mask his own.

He edged along the wall until the monsters and guardhouse alike were out of sight, then traded his wand for his second advantage. It was a silver metal rod, about the length of a wand, etched with swirling black archaic symbols.

Daphne called it a _stele_ – a tool used by goblins and Gringotts employed wizards to create the most powerful runic wards. Much more accurate and efficient at drawing than any wand. This was his grand prize. The payment he'd extracted from Fred and George in exchange for the Triwizard Tournament winnings he'd given them.

_*Yeah… now's probably a good time to rewind slightly…_

* * *

**Two months previously…**

Harry slammed the front door of Privet Drive closed, fuming, desperately holding back the curses – both magical and mundane – he wanted to scream at the world.

Voldemort was BACK! He'd seen it happen! He'd been standing right there! He'd fought the motherfucking snake-faced bastard in front of a dozen Death Eaters, all of whom he'd named for Fudge and Dumbledore both! And what did he get? Sent back to prison, just like always.

The letters he'd just received from Ron and Hermione… they were the last straw. 'Oh, we can't tell you what's going on Harry'. 'Dumbledore made us promise!' 'We're in a special location we can't talk about, but it's definitely boring'.

It was the biggest piece of _bull-shit_ he'd ever been fed, and coming from him, that was saying something.

He turned back to the house with a scowl. No. Harry Potter did _not_ sit on his ass. He was very good at brooding, and that was precisely what he'd spent the first three days of the holiday doing as he'd prepared the meals and did the laundry and trimmed the hedges as if nothing had happened. But the good thing about brooding was that it very easily led to planning. He'd learned _that_ from Batman, and Harry had long ago realised that Batman – while not the sanest of role models – was not a bad person for a young wizard constantly being coerced to battle the forces of evil to emulate.

He stomped to the end of the driveway and held his wand point first into the air.

The now-familiar ' _BANG!'_ of the Knight Bus ripped through the muggle street, and the three-story purple bus materialised in front of him.

"Hi Stan," Harry said, tossing the man a galleon as he boarded the purple monstrosity. He couldn't help casting a look back at the house as he stalked up the steps, and just caught sight of Aunt Petunia's head peeking through the curtains. He suppressed a laugh. The first time he'd summoned the Bus to Number 4, she'd fainted and had to be hauled back into the house by Dudley. Since then, she'd apparently found the bus incredibly fascinating, as every time he'd used it, she always watched for some reason.

"Ah 'Arry! What do I keep telling ya, it's just eleven sickles to ride you know…"

"And how many times do I have to tell you, the rest is my contribution to keeping this magnificent service of yours running."

Harry knew full well that none of the extra money he gave the man would end up going to the Bus. The freshly dry-cleaned coat Stan wore was a testament to that. But Harry had stopped carrying sickles and nuts after Daphne explained to him that his trust vault at Gringotts was self-replenishing. In other words, no matter how much money he took out, it would _always_ restore itself to 3000 galleons in a month's time. It was, for all intents and purposes, an allowance _._

"So, where ya head'n?" Stan asked.

Harry took a deep breath. He'd been putting this off for a very long time, but, really, what did he have to lose?

"Godric's Hollow please."

_*That might not have been back far enough…_

_All right… where should we… Oh I know. This makes much more sense._

* * *

**_The night Harry Potter's name came out of the Goblet of Fire…_ **

Daphne Greengrass slipped into the Great Hall, two shadows following behind.

"Daph, this is _insane._ We shouldn't be here!" Tracey Davis hissed, short black hair framing a very pale face, eyes darting around the room.

"You didn't have to come," Daphne snapped back, straightening as she realised there was no one in the room. As she'd hoped, the Goblet of Fire had been left in its position in the centre of the room, completely forgotten amidst the shock of Harry Potter apparently cheating to get into the Tournament. Honestly, given the constant crap that happened to the kid, wouldn't it have made more surprising if he _hadn't_ been involved in the tournament?

Her third accomplice was the last person anyone would expect. Strawberry blonde hair, and a face completely opposite of Tracey's, Susan Bones practically _bounced_ towards the Goblet, waving her wand ahead of her as she did so. She stopped short a few paces away – where Dumbledore's age-line had stood – and a few seconds later, a string of runic letters in a perfect circle around the stone goblet revealed themselves, glowing with a faint blue light.

"You were right Daph," Susan said, smile stretched so wide it reached her eyes, "It _was_ a localised ward scheme. That's why the Weasley Twins and their aging potion didn't work."

Daphne allowed herself a small smile of victory. She was the best student in their year at Ancient Runes. Better even than Granger – which was saying something. She _loved_ runes. Found the idea that simple words could convey so much power to be utterly thrilling. She'd lost count of how many hours she'd lost studying the tiny squiggles of lost civilisations, trying to uncover their secrets. Her uncle, Franklin Greengrass, was attached to the New York district of Gringotts, and he'd lent her some of his high-level rune books when she'd asked. He'd even, breaking almost a dozen laws, showed her his _stele_. A device very carefully controlled and hidden from wizards by the Goblins, as per their agreement with the Clave. Even Daphne, with all the political knowledge burnt into her mind by endless lessons, didn't know what the mysterious _'Clave'_ was. Only that it was very, very secretive.

She stepped up beside Susan and scrutinised the ward line.

"Sanskrit," she said definitively, "It's a maths equation, designed to calculate the magical age of a person attempting to cross then accept or expel them."

"Then how did Potter get past it?" Susan asked, brows furrowed. Daphne and Susan, both heirs to powerful Pureblood houses, had gravitated to each other in the low population Rune class. Susan was nowhere near as good as Daphne was – Arithmancy was more her thing – but they worked reasonably well together, and she was good at thinking outside the box. A skill Daphne, sadly, lacked.

"I… I don't know. It's a relatively simple chain. You'd just need to change the variables to accept whatever age you were. But Potter doesn't study runes. Unless Granger did it for him, there's no way he'd know how to do that."

Daphne went down on a knee and drew her wand, then proceeded to do just as she'd explained.

"Scribo." The tip of her wand started glowing white, and she bent over a section of the writing.

_t = (a + n 17)or(17 = a + n); f = (a + n 17)_

"Where the value of 'a' equals the threshold age, and 'n' equals the age of the intruder. The inequality comes back true or false…" Daphne whispered. Then, with a single stroke of her wand, she changed the _f_ variable to a _t._

She stood up with a self-satisfied smirk and watched as the line of lettering flashed green, accepting her new parameters. Then, cool and confident, she stepped across the line without so much as a hesitation.

Tracey blanched.

"Was it really that easy?"

"No," Susan told her, rolling her eyes at Daphne. "She just makes _everything_ runes look easy."

"Oh, it wasn't that hard," Daphne said, extinguishing the drawing spell on her wand then pointing it at the cup. "All you need to know is how to do maths in Sanskrit."

"Specialus Revelio!"

Her spell washed over the cup, revealing… nothing.

"Aren't you worried someone is going to catch us?" Tracey asked.

Daphne shrugged, though whether it was at the cup or her friend she wasn't sure.

"No. The names have already been drawn. Who's going to look at the cup _after_ the names come out?"

Tracey acknowledged that logical answer. Susan, however, was frowning.

"I don't buy it. Even if Potter altered the runes like you did, then switched them back so no one would know, that still gives him the same chance as everyone else who put their names in. It doesn't explain why the cup picked him as a _fourth_ champion."

"Agreed," Daphne said, trying another tactic. One of the spells Uncle Franklin had taught her.

"Variance Expellium!"

Once again, nothing happened.

"Bugger," she muttered, as Susan and Daphne stepped up beside her.

"What?"

"The cup doesn't run on runes, or any visible spells. It has to be enchanted from the inside." She bit her lip. "There's no way Potter fucked with this thing; Granger or another student either. Someone a lot smarter than any of us had to have done it."

Susan scratched her head.

"He's innocent?"

"Looks like," she muttered.

Tracey winced. "Poor dude. Binding magical contract and all. Guys fucked."

If Potter hadn't put his name in himself, someone else had done it _to_ him. If she had to put her money on anyone, it would be Lucius Malfoy.

She shook herself, shrugged, then turned on her heel and walked back out of the rune circle. She wasn't going to learn anything else from the cup, much as she'd wanted too. At least she'd been right about the age line. So what if Potter got himself eaten by something? Maybe Draco would finally stop whining about him all the time.

However, she couldn't help keeping a close eye on Harry Potter as the weeks passed. His friends has almost entirely abandoned him (typical Gryffindors, honestly), and he'd practically vanished from the castle. Save classes, he was utterly invisible, the chaos of the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang creating the perfect environment to disappear. The rare times outside lessons she managed to spot him were at meals. He ate quickly, quietly, didn't speak to anyone, and sat on the entire opposite side of the table from Ron and Hermione. She hadn't seen him this pissed since Ginny Weasley had been thrown in Azkaban for opening the Chamber of Secrets. Or, if you believed Potter, being mind-controlled by a dark-artifact given to her by Lucius Malfoy.

He'd stood atop the Gryffindor table the night after the first-year had been carted away in chains – an enormous silver sword in hand – and narrated to the entire school his investigation of the Heir of Slytherin, and how it had led him down into the Chamber to rescue Ginny, who had actually been the only thing preventing the spectre of fucking _You-Know-Who_ from murdering every muggle-born in the school. Then, all because he'd destroyed the artifact in question and freed her, the Weasleys had no proof to fight against the Malfoy lawyers at her trial.

Daphne believed his story, if only because her father had been in the Wizengamot chamber when Fudge had demanded the girl speak Parseltongue to the court, and she'd broken down in tears unable to do so.

But right now… Potter looked like he might lash out at the first person who looked at him wrong. Not for the first time, she wondered if she should tell him her suspicions. Then she inwardly berated herself and reminded that annoying self-righteous streak of hers that it was none of her business.

Such arguments usually lasted a whole week before she repeated the cycle.

It took her a month before her guilt pushed her to act. The last straw was the article by Rita Skeeter, and seeing everyone – from all four houses – laugh their heads off at him.

She managed to corner the bugger after he fled the Great Hall, tracking him down the lake.

The rest, as they say, is history.

* _There we go. That's more like it. Now, back to the fun part._

* * *

_**Now...** _

Harry stepped away from the wall of Azkaban, admiring his handy work. He was in no way an expert at drawing runes, but he'd been practicing this one with Daphne since he'd come up with this mad-cocked plan.

Sagittarius. The Zodiac Rune of Intangibility. Capable of shifting people or substances slightly out of phase with reality for very limited amounts of time.

As soon as the glyph was complete, he pressed a hand to the wall and pumped a tiny bit of magic into the rune. The symbol flashed white, and Harry stepped through the wall as if it was never there.

He emerged in a dark corridor, the dripping of water from the roof echoing ominously. Several large cells occupied by a few people in rags, camp-beds pushed against the wall, lined the inner circle of the tower, and Harry couldn't help shivering at the sight of them.

A part of him, the most Gryffindor part, the one that spoke in Ron's voice, _screamed_ at him to help them.

A second voice, Hermione's, urged caution. Wizarding law may be full of pitfalls used to trap muggle-borns and the unsuspecting, but he honestly didn't know if these people were criminals or not.

A third voice, the part of him Daphne and Tracey had spent months trying to unlock from the depths of his mind, urged him to keep moving. This was the furthest he'd ever gotten. He had to find Ginny. Had to save her.

It was this new person, the one that listened to Daphne's honied voice that Harry had found himself more and more enraptured by since she'd helped him win the Triwizard Tournament, that he listened too. He turned away from the poor figures, and without once looking back, advanced deeper into the prison.

* * *

**_Two months ago…_ **

As midnight bells tolled through the little town of Godric's Hollow, Harry stepped inside the destroyed house and suppressed a shiver.

It was wrong. So utterly wrong. They'd turned the place his parents died into a _fucking_ monument. The house was exactly the same as he must have left it. Roof caved in, door blasted open, debris scattered in all directions.

He honestly wouldn't have been surprised if his parents' corpses had been left where they fell too.

Thankfully they hadn't.

Harry, an odd numbness settling over him, made his way through the house. It was smaller than Privet Drive… quaint, in a way that seemed to fit the town perfectly. The open-plan kitchen and dining room dominated the bottom floor, leaving little space for anything else. Upstairs contained only three rooms. A master bedroom Harry didn't have the courage to enter, a guest room where Padfoot or Moony had no doubt slept, and a small child's room, done up like a nursery. Inside, just like the rest of the house, was a destroyed crib; toys and shattered wood discarded all over the room.

And a black burnt patch on the floor.

Tears in his eyes, he knelt down and pressed a hand to the blackened carpet.

This was where his mother died. Where she'd sacrificed herself to save his life.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I didn't matter. Not really. He's back, and nothing's changed."

His eyes caught on a short shaft of wood, too well carved to be debris, on the floor beneath the ruined cot. He grabbed the hilt with gentle hands, and pulled out a short, exquisite wand.

For a few moments, nothing happened. He felt no catch of magic, no rush of power or humming or resonance as he'd felt with other wands he'd used, and he thought perhaps he'd made a mistake. Then, the wand _jumped_ in his hand, shooting a blast of hot white sparks.

Despite the shaking of his legs and the tears in his eyes, he spared himself a soft smile.

Another of the things Daphne had taught him, was how the trace worked. Magic could be tracked back to a person's wand, or it could be traced to a localised area. Not both. It was how most Pureblood families got past the rules. They lived in homes with plenty of magic anyway. In reality, it was a way of tracking accidental or illegal magic performed by muggle-borns, or people with something to hide. If he used a wand that wasn't his, in a place where people used lots of magic anyway, he'd be safe.

Sometime later, when he was all out of tears, he made his way down to the house Floo with his mother's wand in hand. Taking some of the left-over powder, and hoping it wasn't contaminated somehow, he lit the flames with an incendio, stepped in and shouted.

"Greengrass Manor."

He _hated_ the Floo. Detested it. He closed his eyes and held his breath as the swirling hurtling motion of transport by fireplace threw him across the country, until, eventually he was spat out on a cold stone floor.

Ash clogged his throat and he heaved air in and out, trying to push himself upright.

A wand tip pressed against his neck.

He reacted.

He kicked with his feet behind him, catching his opponent's leg, who let out a grunt. Then he rolled forward in a rush like Sirius had taught him, and came to his feet, wand snapping up to face his attacker.

He was a tall man, blonde-haired, dressed in nothing but boxer-shorts, chest bare and hairy. His eyes were clouded with sleep, but his expression was fierce, and Harry realised internally that arriving via Floo unannounced in the middle of the night probably wasn't the smartest thing he'd ever done.

"Dad, what's going on!?" Daphne's voice yelled, and seconds later, on a balcony above the room where Harry stood, the blonde Slytherin appeared. And she was wearing nothing but a very sheer nighty, a robe thrown hastily over the top. His blood instantly travelled south.

"Harry!"

Apparently, despite the soot and ash covering him, the state of his oversized and torn muggle clothes, and what had to be the worst hair he'd ever had, she recognised him instantly. He blamed the glasses.

" _This_ is 'Harry'?" the man called, hostile expression fading into something akin to revulsion.

Daphne ran for the nearest set of stairs, and Harry finally realised he was standing in the middle of an enormous ballroom, complete with chandelier and stained-glass windows.

"Ritzy place you got here," Harry muttered as Daphne came running down the stairs. Then, seemingly without thinking, she placed herself between her father and Harry. He couldn't help smiling at that.

"Dad, stand down. He's my friend. I told him to come here if anything happened…"

Lord Greengrass lowered his wand, face now a full-on frown. Daphne relaxed, then spun around and pulled Harry into a soft hug despite the ash, which he returned gladly. Though, given his current… predicament, and the fact that her get-up left little to the imagination, he made sure only their upper-bodies pressed together.

She pulled back, then drew a handkerchief from her gown and started dabbing his face.

"Are you alright?" She asked softly, lips pursed in a frown of concern as she scrutinised him.

"Yeah… I just had to get out of there." He reached into his pocket and withdrew the letters from his friends. She took them and pocketed them without looking at them.

"Come on, I'll get you settled in a guest room. We can… we can talk about what to do tomorrow. Right now, you look beat."

He gave her a soft smile, then she started leading him away.

"Uh… Daphne, care to explain?!" her father demanded, seemingly dumbfounded at the turn of events.

"Tomorrow dad. Harry needs rest." And with that, she led him away, leaving her bewildered father behind her.

He was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

"Expecto Patronum!"

A heavy wave of white light burst from Lily Potter's wand, blasting two Dementors back up the stairs.

_"Nice work. Now remember, second-tier security should be just around this next level. Don't go up the stairs! You'll flag the high detection wards. There's no way in hell I'd be able to walk you through something that complicated. I'm no Wardbinder."_

He nodded, though obviously no one could see him, and advanced down the corridor. This level was for dangerous criminals condemned to solitary confinement. The urge to try and investigate the poor souls once again reared its ugly head, but Harry fought it back easily this time. Most of these people truly were here for heinous crimes. There was no denying that.

"Lumos."

Down the hallway he trekked, looking into each shadowed alcove for any sign of red hair. It didn't take him long to find her.

"Ginny?" He whispered, pressing against the cold iron bars of the tiny cell. A bundled figure wearing nothing but a baggy threadbare shirt was huddled on a patch of straw in the back corner that was supposed to be a bed. Her hair was as long as she was tall, and what had once been fiery golden-red had dulled to a dirty, matted muddy brown mess. Her skin was pale as snow, but even from here he could see the crust of dry blood and cuts and scars that hadn't been there when he'd seen her last.

Harry clenched his teeth, a very different urge rearing its head. A primal need to inflict pain on someone, anyone responsible for doing this. Not for the first time, he cursed the name Weasley.

* * *

**_After the trial…_ **

"What do we do now?" Harry demanded, barely contained anger boiling beneath his skin as he was marched back through the Floo into the Headmaster's office. Mr and Mrs Weasley followed behind. Percy, Ron, Fred and George were already waiting for them, standing with the two brothers he'd never met before. Bill and Charlie.

"I'm afraid there's nothing we can do," Dumbledore said simply, sitting down behind his desk and rubbing a hand across his forehead. "Mr Malfoy's case was iron-shod. With the Diary destroyed, there's no way to confirm Miss Weasley was being controlled, nor do we have any proof that it was he that gave her the Diary."

"But you have to do something!" Harry begged. "You're Albus Dumbledore!"

Dumbledore sighed and offered him a tired smile.

"While I admire your faith in me Harry; I cannot do the impossible."

Harry clenched his jaw and turned towards Molly and Arthur. Mr Weasley wore the same expression he'd had since Ginny had been taken from the hospital wing by the Aurors. A frozen expression of numbness. Mrs Weasley, on the other hand, had gone through more emotional onslaughts than the weather. She'd ranted and raged, cried and sobbed, screamed in fury… you name it, she'd done it in the past few days. But now… now she just seemed resigned.

"There has to be something…"

"I'm sorry Harry," Mrs Weasley whispered, tears streaming down her face. "But… But Ginny must take responsibility for what she's done. If that means… if that means a stay in Azkaban… then so be it."

Not believing his ears, he spun on the other Weasleys.

"You're just going to let this slide?!"

Ron gave an apathetic shrug and Percy didn't even flinch. Fred and George at least looked as mad as he felt, and Charlie and Bill had both seemingly fallen into the same expression of numbness as their father.

"Harry… I understand you're mad. I assure you, I will keep looking into this, but I fear any search would be in vain," Dumbledore said, "For now, I suggest you go and pack your trunk and prepare to return to the Dursley's for the summer."

Harry snorted. "Return to prison you mean." He marched towards the door, then cast a final look back at the room. Mrs Weasley was openly wailing now.

"I thought you guys were the perfect family… turns out I was imagining something that doesn't exist." Then he slammed the door in their faces, ignoring Mrs Weasley's wailing screams.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

That had been when he'd finally put aside his – rather naïve, now that he understood life a little better – belief that real families were perfect, and that, if he found one, everything in his life would be better.

It was also the last time he'd ever trusted something Dumbledore said at face value. He supposed, looking back, he should have realised the type of person Ron was then. But he didn't. His anger had kept him from seeing the truth at the time, and then he was sent back to the Dursleys and distracted by _Aunt_ Marge. He'd blown up his Aunt, gotten caught by Fudge, learned about Sirius Black, then tried to break into Azkaban the first time to rescue Ginny. The rest of that year was spent being hunted down by not-so serial killer Sirius Black, and with Hermione preoccupied with her time-travelling shenanigans, he'd clung to Ron.

The Triwizard tournament had been a harsh wakeup call. The last nail in the coffin of sweet and innocent Harry Potter.

Following Daphne's whispered instructions, he bypassed the locking spells on the door and slowly stepped inside, sticking the Lumos spell to the wall. He knelt down beside the bundle of rags and gently placed a hand on Ginny's shoulder. God she was tiny…

"Ginny?"

The red-head finally stirred, eyes fluttering open to reveal dull chocolate orbs, black bags beneath her irises.

"Wha…" She tried to speak, but it came out as an inaudible croak, which then turned into a fit of hacking coughs. Tiny droplets of blood splattered his hand.

Not good.

"Ginny… it's alright. It's me, Harry. I'm going to get you out of here."

He hooked his arms under her shoulders, and lifted her rake thin body with ease. If it weren't for the bag over her shoulders, he was certain he'd see ribs.

"Daphne," he muttered into the dark, "We've got a problem. Ginny's sick. She can barely open her eyes, let alone walk."

_"Shit. You can't fight your way out of there with a girl in your arms."_

"I know," he answered.

"Hey! Is someone there?!" A horse voice yelled. One of the prisoners. He needed to move.

"Har… Harry… u… came…" Ginny croaked, eyes fluttering closed, head rolling into his chest. There was barely any colour to her body at all, and Harry tucked a lock of her matted hair behind her ear.

"Aye! Let me out! I can help!" the voice yelled, louder this time. It was joined by another, then another, until the entire floor was in an uproar.

Oh for the love of _fuck…_

He pulled the invisibility cloak tightly around himself and Ginny, then rushed out of the cell and down the hallway he'd come.

"Daphne… do you remember how we got through the lake task…"

* * *

**_A few days before the Yule Ball…_ **

Harry stood in the prefect's bathroom, trying very hard not to be self-conscious as he pulled his robes over his head.

It was the dead of night, long after curfew, and Daphne – after sending the Egg to her father – had determined that the screeching golden pain in the ass needed to be opened underwater. Harry hadn't liked the idea of cheating, until Daphne pointed out that the very idea of _'cheating'_ was ultimately subjective to the person cheated. Given that, in this case, he didn't care about cheating Dumbledore or the Ministry, he'd followed through with her plan. As neither of them wished to dive into the lake in the middle of winter, Daphne's mother had given them the password for the prefect's bathroom, and Harry had snuck down to the dungeons with his invisibility cloak to retrieve the Slytherin girl. If someone had told him he'd be exposing his most precious secret to a _Slytherin_ a year ago? He'd have told them to jump of the Astronomy Tower. Now? He'd barely thought about it.

What he _was_ thinking about, was the fact that Daphne – confident, cunning and gorgeous Daphne – had just thrown off her robes to reveal a swimsuit that left _very_ little to the imagination.

She jumped into the enormous bath without looking at him, then emerged like a mermaid from the bubbly water, blonde hair billowing out along the surface. Her cheeks were flushed, though he couldn't tell if that was from the heat or her actions, and a cheeky smile plastered on her face – so maybe it was the later.

Not to be outdone, and reasonably confident in his appearance given all the exercise he did, he grabbed the egg and slid into the water himself.

"Ready?"

He nodded, and they sunk beneath the water together.

Fifteen minutes later, after listening to the recording several times, Daphne and Harry remained seated next to each other in the bathtub. Most of the bubbles were now gone, but deciphering the riddle at least served as a way to distract his mind from Daphne's curves – very evident given their current state. He was just really glad they were now _above_ the water.

"You don't think they'll actually take _hostages,_ do you?" He asked.

"I'd count on it. It's exactly the sort of thing you'd expect from a game like this. It'll be one of your friends or family most likely… someone you'd sorely miss."

Harry ran a hand through his wet hair.

"Well, I don't have any family. None I'd care enough about anyway. That leaves friends. Ron still won't talk to me, and that ship sailed a while ago. Most of Gryffindor like me again now, but that's only because I won the dragon task, not because they're my friends. Neville's a friend, but only recently… I suppose Hermione could be it, but we're still on shaky ground so maybe not."

He bit his lip.

"If I had to bet, it'll probably be you. Or maybe Tracey, but I'd guess you. You're about the only friend I've got left that I trust."

Daphne blushed, and Harry looked away, embarrassed. A soft hand came to rest on his shoulder, and he turned back around to find his face only a few inches from hers.

"Thanks," she whispered. "I… I'm not good at making friends. You really trust me?"

He swallowed.

"Definitely."

She sucked in a breath, and a soft twinkle appeared in her crystal blue eyes. Then she leaned forward and kissed him. Chaste yet lingering, giving him just enough time to memorise the taste of her before she pulled away, face as red as a tomato.

A spark ripped through his brain.

"Daph… did you want to go to the Yule Ball with me?"

She sat back in the water, shock sliding across her face, and Harry thought he'd made a horrible mistake. Then she smiled and leaned into his side.

"I'd love to. But I'll have to clear it with my father first. He's… well, he's traditional like that. Going to something like the Yule Ball together, with _you_ of all people… it would cause a stir. But he'll say yes if I ask right."

They lapsed into silence for a moment, before Daphne spoke up again.

"You do have dress-robes, don't you?"

Harry winced.

"I'll have to get some at Hogsmeade."

And then, Harry realised he'd made a very, _very_ big mistake. Because Daphne's face lit up with the most Slytherin expression he'd ever seen on her face.

"Oh I'm going to have _sooooo_ much fun with you. We'll need black with a hazel hem to match the eyes… hmm, and maybe lined with the standard protection enchantments, can't be too careful… oh, and maybe a rune scheme for anti-theft…" She trailed off, smiling sliding into an expression of deep thought.

"What?"

"I think I know how to get us through the Second Task."

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Daphne landed softly on Azkaban island via portkey, and immediately flattened herself against the windswept stone as alarms shrieked through the air. Why was she doing this!? It was the most _un-_ Slytherin thing anyone had ever done! The answer of course, like so many of the things she'd done the past year, could be boiled down to one single truth.

Harry Potter's bloody, infectious smile.

Shivering beneath her winter coat, she pulled a pre-made mallenium rune-stone from her pocket and placed it on the ground. Then, carefully, she drew her wand and pointed it at the stone.

Cut into the smooth glossy object – which, while looking like rock, was actually a type of metal – was another of the Zodiac Runes. This time the Cancer Rune. A rune designed to drastically amplify the single next spell a person cast.

This was their back up plan.

After the Yule Ball, Daphne had made sure to keep a single ward-stone she'd created on her person at all times. It was simple and to the point. A broadcaster. A giant beacon pointing out her location at any given time. Harry had kept the receiver, and, when she'd indeed been abducted for the task, Harry had used the Cancer Rune and the resulting very overpowered Accio Charm to summon her directly from the bottom of the lake. She'd had serious rope burn on her foot by the time she reached the surface, but the looks on everyone's faces – student and teacher alike – when Harry Potter, the youngest champion, finished the Second Task without getting wet were _sooo_ worth it.

"Expecto Patronum!" She shouted, letting the memory of her and Harry dancing at the Yule Ball flood her mind, directing the spell into the rune. The glyph pulsed once, twice, three times.

Then, it _exploded_ outwards with enough force to blast Daphne – lying on her stomach – up into the air, flipping her over twice before she crashed back to the ground, her shoulder snapping as she hit rock. She screamed in abject terror as pain burst through her arm and she grabbed the rock with her good hand, desperately trying not to slip off the island. She gained her footing and pulled herself back up, and only then – shoulder burning – did she lookup.

A wall of white power _crashed_ across the entire island, blasting Dementors away by the hundreds. Instantly, the feeling of depression engulfing the prison lessened considerably.

Panting with effort, she pulled herself to her knees, drawing her return portkey from within her robes.

That was the Dementors dealt with for a few minutes. Harry just needed to evade the Aurors – and the reinforcements no doubt on their way.

"Whoever you are, surrender now, and we won't kill you instantly!" A rough voice shouted from beyond the corner where Harry hid, heavy breathing with an unconscious Ginny Weasley in his arms.

He'd felt the pearly white light of hope pulse through the prison. Daphne's Rune had worked. But it would only last for a few minutes. He needed to bolt. _Now._

He'd made it to the first level before the Aurors had caught him. By now, they'd barricaded themselves between him and the main entrance. Harry had tried to go through the wall again, but the alarms had triggered some sort of security, and the _stele_ couldn't find purchase on the stone for some reason.

Duelling two Aurors on his own wouldn't be too hard. Thanks to Malfoy and the other lords of the Wizengamot, the Auror force was a shadow of what it had once been. But with Ginny, a resistant wand, and a time limit? Even with all the skill and training he'd done for the Tournament, he did not like those odds

Cursing under his breath, he lowered Ginny to the ground and leant her back against the wall.

Then, clenching his jaw, he spun into the walkway beyond.

"Depulso!"

The banishing charm, Sirius had taught him, was very useful when fighting multiple opponents. It was very difficult to shield against, and was forbidden by international duelling convention, so few thought to use it in a fight. The spell had saved his life in the maze, and it did the same here.

Two stunners later, the Aurors were unconscious on the ground, and Harry, having retrieved his charge, was running through the door to freedom.

* * *

**_The night of the Yule Ball…_ **

"Wait, you have no idea what's in your family vault?" Daphne asked, aghast, as she and Harry spun around the dance floor. There were over a dozen other pairs on the floor with them, but she could tell they were the ones gathering the most attentive looks. Looks of utter confusion. From every house. She had spotted Malfoy a little earlier, and it looked as though he might have had an aneurism. Ron Weasley looked little better, face so red one could be mistaken for thinking him a furnace ready to burst.

She couldn't blame them. Even she was having a hard time believing she was dancing around the Great Hall with _Harry Potter_ , Gryffindor's golden boy and Triwizard champion, on her arm.

"Nope. I've only ever been allowed into my trust vault."

Harry twirled her around, and Daphne's gorgeous crimson dress swirled around her ankles.

"I suppose that makes sense…" she muttered; brows furrowed. "You'd need someone with permission to let you in. No parents… who's your magical guardian?"

Harry shrugged. "No idea. Probably Sirius if I had to guess."

All colour vanished from Daphne's face, and it was only years of training with her mother and sister that saved her from missing her steps.

"Sirius… Sirius _Black!_ The madman criminal who broke into the castle last year! _"_

Harry chuckled softly to himself.

"Yeah, him. Madman? Yes. Criminal? Nah. Guy's a puppy dog at heart."

Daphne's jaw fell open. _What?_

"Remind me to tell you the whole story later. It involves time-turning, the grim, my firebolt, werewolves, a really smart cat, and a group of pranksters from 20 years ago."

She shook herself and turned her attention back to the original topic. She'd get answers about _that_ later.

"Ok… Family vault… so you've never seen the thing… you've never gotten an audit report from Gringotts?"

Harry frowned. "I've never gotten any mail from Gringotts. What's an audit?"

Alarm bells started ringing in Daphne's brain.

"It's a list of your available assets. Gringotts should, at least, be sending you a copy of your trust vault statement if it's in your name. If you're the only name on the family vault, you should get that one too, even if you can't use it until you're seventeen."

Harry's frown deepened even further.

"That doesn't sound right then."

"No. It doesn't."

"What should I do?"

"Send a letter to Gringotts; fast. If something is wrong with your mail, you need to know."

Harry fell silent for the rest of the dance, and once the song finished playing, she pulled him out of the dancing couples and over to Tracey and the Weasley Twins, who were standing around the punch table.

"Ah! If it isn't the dashing fourth champion and his Slytherin princess!" Fred exclaimed. Daphne, noticing from his loose posture and carefree expression the tells of someone who had consumed alcohol, scanned Weasley's person. Sure enough, she spotted a flask poking out of his pocket.

"Don't hold out on me," she snapped at him, gesturing to the flask. Weasley looked shocked for a second as Tracey laughed, but handed over the flask with little to say.

"Say, Fred, George," Harry began. His gaze was fixed at the head table. Specifically, on Albus Dumbledore.

"You guys have a vault at Gringotts for the money you make from your joke stuff, right? That's how you hide it from your mum?" The twins shared a concerned look.

"Yeah… but how'd you know about that?" George asked, voice low.

"Hermione figured it out," Harry said, not really paying attention. "You get audits for your vault? Even if there's not a lot in there?"

George looked thoroughly flummoxed, so Fred answered him.

"Yeah…" Harry turned away from the headmaster to look Daphne dead in the eye.

"Fancy sneaking out of the castle and taking a trip to London with me?"

Daphne's heart fluttered in her chest, gaze fixed on that… that _smile_. Merlin, she was so totally damned to hell.

"It's a date."

Over Harry's shoulder, Tracey winked at her, then took a long sip of punch, smirking the whole time.

* * *

**_About a week later…_ **

Dressed in her most business-like robes, Daphne led Harry into Gringotts after taking the Knight Bus from Hogsmeade to Diagon Alley. Once inside the enormous marble building, she glided towards a specific teller on the right side of the room.

"Mister Snaptooth," Daphne declared, standing straight-backed and jaw clenched, "May you roll in the blood of your enemies for all eternity." The wizened old goblin looked up sharply at the sound of her voice and shot her a toothy grin.

"And may your vaults be ever overflowing with riches, Miss Greengrass. How may I be of service today?"

Daphne gestured to Harry, who gave an awkward wave.

"My friend here, Mr Harry Potter, has recently discovered that he hasn't been receiving his scheduled audits from Gringotts. If it's not overstepping my bounds, could you perhaps put us onto the right track in where he should direct his inquiry?"

Snaptooth's smile fell, replaced by a look of concern.

"One moment, Miss Greengrass. I will find the Potter accounts manager for you myself." The goblin stepped back from his teller and disappeared behind the marble benches.

"Wow. I've never seen someone handle Goblins that well," Harry remarked, giving her a small clap. Daphne blushed.

"Comes with the territory," she said awkwardly, "my father is a rather high-profile lawyer, so he knows more about Goblin culture than most wizards. I've known Snaptooth since I was a girl."

They stood in silence for a while as other wizards and goblins had conversations around them, until Snaptooth returned with another Goblin; this one considerably younger, and far more ugly.

"Oh!" Harry exclaimed. "Griphook! Good to see you again."

Griphook grunted.

"And you, Mr Potter. Snaptooth says you haven't been receiving your audits? Impossible. I sent the last one only two weeks ago."

Daphne tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. She didn't like this. First the Goblet of Fire? Now someone interfering with Harry's money at Gringotts?

"I haven't received anything, um, master goblin," Harry said, shaking his head. "I didn't even know I was _supposed_ to be getting anything before Daphne mentioned it."

Snaptooth and Griphook shared two very worried glances, and starting talking rapidly in the goblin language. Louder and louder their argument rose, until, eventually, the goblins at the nearby stations stopped their work to watch them.

After five minutes of shouting, both goblins stalked away from the teller and straight towards the wall behind them. A goblin-sized passageway formed from the marble, and the two Goblins marched inside and each grabbed a wicked looking double-headed battle-axe hanging from the wall.

"I think this might be bigger than we thought," Daphne murmured. Harry swallowed, then took her hand in his and gave it a squeeze.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Harry was staggering and sweating something fierce by the time he reached the place where Daphne was waiting for them. In the distance, they could hear the cracks of at least a dozen wizards simultaneously Apparating onto the island.

"Come on!" she shouted, grabbing his arm. Then she removed her portkey, took one look at the returning onslaught of Dementors, and activated the necklace.

A hook wrapped itself behind Harry's navel, and he was jerked back into a tunnel of rainbow light, falling and flying at the same time.

A few seconds later, it was over, and Harry, Daphne and Ginny touched down a few metres from the ward lines surrounding Greengrass Manor.

The ancestral home of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Greengrass was atop the fells of Cumbria's Lake District, obscured from muggle detection by what appeared to be a sheer cliff drop into a pristine lake below. In fact, the sprawling manor house was built into the mountainside, and had been a reward given to the family by Henry Tudor for saving the life of his future bride, Elizabeth of York.

"Quickly!" Daphne called, waving her wand towards the cliffside. "We don't know if they can track the portkey signature!"

As she said the words, the manor seemed to grow out of thin air, an enormous hedge and steel fence appearing at the cliff's edge. The gate swung open and Daphne rushed over the ward-line, Harry not far behind. Only for a magical shield to form and bounce he and Ginny backwards onto the turf.

"What was that?!" Harry exclaimed. Daphne started heavy breathing.

"I don't know!"

She reached across the ward and grabbed his arm, attempting to pull him through. But his arm couldn't cross.

"The war-wards must be active," Daphne realised, looking down the cliffside towards the manor entrance. "but why… Azkaban. An alert must have gone out and Dad activated the barriers when he noticed I wasn't home."

She cursed under her breath.

"What do we do?"

"Only a Greengrass can enter…"

She stopped, eyes widening. Then she swallowed and stuck her wand into the transparent shield.

"Dad's going to kill me for this… Harry, you have to ask me to marry you."

"WHAT?!" He asked, jaw falling slack.

"Just do it! I can't let you through the wards until you're connected to House Greengrass somehow."

Harry glanced down to the red-head in his arms.

"What about Ginny?"

Daphne froze, hopping from foot to foot.

"Um, um, um… come on. _Think_ Daphne think! _"_ She grabbed a strand of her hair in hand and yanked it.

"You saved her life in the Chamber of Secrets, right?"

"Yeah…"

"Then she owes you a life debt, which should count, I hope. I don't know. It's the best I've got. Quick!"

Harry froze for five seconds, then a crack tore through the forest a short distance away.

"Daphne Greengrass, will you marry me?"

Not how'd he thought he'd ever end up saying those words.

"Yes! Now come one!" she pleaded. Her wand glowed white for a second, then a ripple passed through the shield. More cracks, and voices started yelling behind him. _Oh hell…_

He jumped through the ward… and slid through the barrier like water, Ginny still in his arms. His feet his earth, and Daphne was waving her wand again. The gate vanished, consumed by the hedge just as two heads appeared beyond.

All sound outside the grounds vanished, replaced by the soft singing of birds, and Harry fell to his knees, taking in several rapid breaths. Daphne sank down beside him and looked into his eyes, face flushed and body shaking.

Harry looked into her eyes, then down at the girl in his arms.

"We did it," he whispered.

"Holy… we _did_ that!" Daphne exclaimed, face cracking into a brilliant smile. "We just jailbreaked someone out of the most secure prison this side of the _Atlantic!_ "

An owl flew through the enchanted barrier, bearing straight for the house. Daphne winced.

"That… will be the Ministry registrar," she said, "congratulating my father on our betrothal."

Harry swallowed, and Daphne looked down at her shoes.

"So, um, do I get to call you babe now?" Harry asked awkwardly. Daphne shot him a murderous look.

" _Ever_ call me that Potter, and I'll show you how good I am at the Cockblocker Curse. Got that?"

Now it was Harry's turn to wince.

"Yes… _fiancé_."

And with that, they both cracked up laughing.

* * *

**_There you all go. Whatcha think? You guys want a part II? I'm thinking maybe a full dark spin. Something I've never done before, so that could be fun._ **

**_Also, on a slightly related note, who else is super pumped for this Skyrim style Hogwarts RPG game? I saw the trailer a couple days ago, and I have to say, I really, really hope they put some decent effort into the different subjects you can learn and not just the standard DADA and Charms. Fingers crossed it isn't a total crapshoot like Square's Avengers game. Boy was that a disappointment._ **


	2. Chapter 2

#  _Two_

_‘Dear Padfoot,_

_As it’s been three days now since I went missing, I’m assuming you’ve managed to get your paws on a copy of the Daily Prophet, and are currently having a heart attack._

_I suppose the first thing I should say is that I solemnly swear that I’m fine, even if you probably won’t believe me._

_The second thing, and I trust you not to tell the old codger this bit, is that I’m currently hiding behind the Greengrass family war wards. Which is kind of how this whole betrothal thing started. Because you see, I kind of broke into Azkaban.’_

_‘Again, don’t worry, I’m okay. I only went in for one prisoner and managed to get back out before the Aurors arrived. I doubt any of the Weasleys will care (except maybe the Twins), but you can tell them that Ginny is no longer a resident in that fucking hell-hole if you want. She’s thin as a rake, can barely drink, has at least three magical diseases and two muggle ones, and screams through the night, but she’s alive._

_‘My being with Daphne probably doesn’t surprise anyone, considering we went to the Yule Ball together and I pulled her from the lake, but I can assure you this whole… betrothal business was honestly an accident. I got tracked leaving Azkaban, and there was only one way to get inside Greengrass Manor without being an actual Greengrass._

_‘Daphne’s family and I have been trying to nurse Ginny back to health, but it’s slow going, and none of us are extensively trained in the healing arts. There’s a troop of Aurors camped outside the manor, so leaving isn’t an option. At least, not until Hogwarts starts again. Please don’t come to the platform! The Aurors will be all over the bloody place! They don’t know it was me that broke Ginny out, but I doubt it takes much guesswork. Fortunately, the Ministry seems to be trying to keep the breakout under wraps – along with everything else even tangentially connected to Voldemort – so that’s a point in my favour. Likewise, this whole engagement is keeping the rank and file wizard (including, I suspect, Dumbledore) distracted for the time being._

_We haven’t decided what we’re going to do about it yet. Daphne’s father… doesn’t like me very much. I’m going to have to woo him. Think a duel will do it? That’s plan A at least. Plan B will have to be something more dramatic if that doesn’t work._

_‘Is there any news you can tell me? I’ve gotten more letters from Ron and Hermione, but they’re just the Headmaster’s words with a friendly coat of paint. Fawkes even brought me a letter from the old codger himself. The bird was rather indignant when I tried to blast it._

_‘Please keep safe,_

_‘Harry.’_

* * *

_**Now...** _

Harry hadn’t thought the timing of their arrival in the Great Hall was very important. Daphne had smacked him across the back of the head and berated him for being utterly politically inept. Theatrics, she’d explained to him, were the most crucial part of the game. Power is an illusion, one that must be carefully crafted and maintained less its feeble nature be exposed.

He had to admit, stalking into the Great Hall in the middle of Umbridge’s speech to the assembled students with his gorgeous bride to be was _a lot_ cooler than just boarding the Hogwarts express like he’d intended.

The entire hall fell into stunned silence, and Harry had to resist the urge to smirk. Instead, he bowed his head towards Dumbledore and Umbridge.

“Apologies for our late arrival Professors, but I’m afraid we were delayed. Wedding preparations and all.”

Dumbledore’s expression didn’t change, but the twinkle in his eyes was very much visible even from the other side of the hall. Umbridge however, looked about ready to blow a gasket.

Project wizarding revolution was officially a go.

* * *

**_One month earlier…_ **

“How’s she doing?” Harry asked as he stepped into the guest bedroom turned infirmary of Greengrass Manor. Sonny Greengrass, currently leaning over a sleeping Ginny, sat back with a long sigh.

“She’s outrun the fever finally, and I’ve cured the pneumonia she had. The shivers… I hope she’ll be strong enough to fight that off on her own now that I’m pumping her full of nutrient potions. That leaves the hepatitis and the blood malediction… I’m sorry, Harry, but I have no idea what to do about them. I’m not a doctor, but even I know that those types of diseases can’t just be cured.” Sonny paused, then swallowed and pushed forward.

“She’s been raped. More than once by my reckoning. And she’s developed a lung infection I can’t diagnose. If we don’t take her to St Mungo’s, I’m certain she’ll die.”

Harry ran a hand through his hair, cursing under his breath. The Aurors outside – including at least three Order of the Phoenix Members by his count – hadn’t let up, despite almost a week of nothing. The Greengrasses had not survived every wizarding and muggle war since the fall of Rome by being stupid. The security around the cliff-side building was the best that money could buy. Even the cave systems within the cliff itself were shielded by a mixture of both Goblin and Dwarven protective enchantments, so there would be no digging or mining underneath them.

The problem with perfect security, however, was that getting out was just as hard as getting in.

“We can’t take down the wards while the Aurors are outside,” Daphne said, arms crossed beneath her breasts and biting her lip, “They’ll arrest everyone here.”

“That would be because you broke the _law_ ,” Jacob said pointedly. Daphne’s father was a finger’s width from throwing Harry off the cliff. Not only had he stolen his daughter, but he’d turned her into a criminal as well. For a famous lawyer, that _had_ to sting. It was terribly funny, though. Fortunately for Harry’s continued existence, according to pureblood law, Daphne was essentially as much Harry’s responsibility as Jacob’s now, thanks to their betrothal. When Daphne had explained that to him, he’d bashed his head into a wall. His response, which for the record, he’d thought was perfectly reasonable, had utterly stumped not only Daphne but her mother and sister as well.

_“So, you’re saying that you don’t actually own yourselves? Under the law? Your father, or your husband, has to make all your decisions for you? A human life treated the same as something I can buy in Diagon Alley? Who on Earth ever thought that was a fair idea!?”_

Daphne had rewarded him with quite the snogging, Sonny probably thought he was a radical communist, and Astoria had taken to following him around like a worshipping puppy. All because he’d expressed, to his mind, a rather basic point. He couldn’t wait for them to meet a feminist rights activist…

“We saved an innocent person’s life,” Daphne retorted, “to hell with the law. It’s only designed to keep people like Malfoy in power, why should we follow it?”

“Because it’s still the law,” Jacob snapped, gritting his teeth. “You can’t just disagree with it! That’s anarchy!”

“That’s democracy,” Harry said, kneeling beside Ginny’s bed and placing a hand on hers, watching the soft lifts and falls of her chest, the wheezing of air flowing through her nose. “What you have is a plutocracy at best, an aristocracy at worst. Even if Voldemort gets his way, there isn’t much further right along the political spectrum you can slide.” He took a deep breath and looked Jacob’s tall, stern figure in the eye.

“The Wizarding World has been separated for so long, you’ve missed the rest of the world passing you by. I’m ashamed to be a wizard if it means that I’m part of this broken system that no one is trying to fix. Dumbledore isn’t trying to improve things, only keep them stagnant, the Ministry isn’t… What your world needs, Mr Greengrass, is a revolution. And until one comes, people like Voldemort are just going to keep rising up again and again.”

Harry stood and left the room, rolling thoughts and plans through his mind.

He’d succeeded. He’d done what he’d had his mind locked on since his second year. But now he had a new goal to achieve. One far harder, and more dangerous. He had to kill Voldemort before he could start his wave of terror all over again. Harry was under no delusions about that. He would have to be the one to kill the snake-faced bastard, he’d learned the hard way that no one in power was going to help him. They all looked to Dumbledore for action, and though Harry was sure the Headmaster had plenty of plans and schemes prepared, he also had no reason to believe the old man wouldn’t throw Harry and everyone else under the bus to achieve them.

He found himself standing on one of the manor’s many balconies, overlooking the shimmering lake below.

What could he do? He was good at Defence… he’d been practising it not stop for the past year, and all that training had paid off when he went toe to toe with the resurrected Dark Lord in the graveyard. He was rich, but he couldn’t access most of his money until he turned seventeen, and someone – presumably Dumbledore – was monitoring his mail and would probably know if he tried to spend large amounts of it.

He wasn’t a brilliant student – just a relentless one. Nor was he exceptionally skilled at communicating with people. He could play Quidditch and was probably the fittest and most physically capable person in his year in the traditional sense – though once again, not out of any particular inclination, more because being fit was a good way to survive being eaten by a _dragon_.

And, perhaps the most critical point in his advantage, he _knew_ Voldemort, better than probably anyone. Maybe even Dumbledore.

So, how could he use his skills against Voldemort?

The answer was obvious.

He couldn’t.

Fighting was all well and good, and defeating Voldemort would come down to a fight, he knew that. But he couldn’t just ‘Expelliarmus’ his way to the finish line. Voldemort was far too clever for that. He needed a plan. What he’d said to Jacob was true. Stopping Voldemort wasn’t enough. The system that created him had to be fixed, and the only way Harry could see to do that was through a revolution. People like Malfoy and Fudge couldn’t exactly be voted out of office. There was a reason muggle nations in the West had moved away from autocratic rule, binding monarchs by constitutions and the rule of law.

He couldn’t start a revolution on his own.

An owl popped through the shimmering war barrier, snow-white feathers stark against the dimming sky. Sure enough, Hedwig landed on the railing in front of him, a letter clutched in her talons. She barked in what Harry could only describe as pride, and he took the note as he ran a hand over her head with the other.

It was from Gringotts. No wonder Hedwig was proud. She must have evaded not only the Aurors outside, but whoever was screening his mail as well.

A second later, a soft _crack_ echoed through the air, and _Dobby_ popped into existence on the balcony beside him, eyes wide in amazement.

“Mr Harry Potter Sir! Dobby is finding your owl, sir! And Dobby thinks, Mr Harry Potter sir’s owl must be on a mission for Mr Harry Potter sir, and so Dobby must help! So Dobby helped Mr Harry Potter sir’s owl past the nasty wizards outside!”

He couldn’t help it. He cracked up laughing, doubling over the metal balustrade and cackling into the open air.

Dobby was dressed in what was undoubtedly his attempt at a smart suit. Attempt being a strong word, as the jacket was a garish pink, the undershirt eggplant purple, and his tie definitely belonged to Ron at some point. And on his feet, one foot with Harry’s sock, and the other without, were fluorescent green wingtips.

Daphne found him like that, and to her credit, she didn’t scream at the sight of the bizarre House elf. Hedwig, evidently, did not find the situation as amusing as Harry did, as she soon started pecking his head.

Face bright red and whole body shaking from his laughter, Harry finally opened the letter and read.

_Mr Harry Potter;_

_On behalf of the Goblin Nation, I find myself in the rather unsettling position of having to apologise to you. Goblins do not apologise, especially not to humans. But you have revealed a grave situation within Gringotts Bank that I must rectify immediately._

_I have taken the liberty of sending you this message via your personal owl to avoid alerting other interested parties. Please visit the Gringotts London Branch at your earliest possible convenience so that I may inform you of the full extent of our incompetence concerning your financial interests. I suggest you bring your recently betrothed as well, as the matter will have significant repercussions for both of you._

_May your future wife be eternally fertile, and your fortunes ever rise;_

_Ragnok, son of Grimnok; Director of Gringotts Bank London._

He handed the letter to Daphne, who was still staring open-mouthed at Dobby the bouncing House Elf.

This situation with the Goblins… it was clearly much worse than he’d thought. And he’d have never known about it if Daphne…

If _Daphne_ hadn’t told him.

He watched her face as she read the letter, analysing her expressions, how her eyes widened and flickered across the page. Even how she blushed at the last line.

And that was when it hit him.

He couldn’t start a revolution on his _own_.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Kissing Daphne’s hand, Harry walked to the Gryffindor table, utterly ignoring the combined stares of awe and hostility being directed his way. He must be quite the sight. Daphne had spent a considerable amount of time tracing the Virgo Rune – the Rune of Illusion – onto his back, then tying it to an image of strength and character. Harry hadn’t believed he’d needed them, but once again deferred to Daphne’s lead. Besides, after looking at himself in the mirror, he had to admit the mirage did make him look quite dashing.

Whispering finally broke out at all four tables, and that seemed to break Umbridge out of her stunned position. She turned on her heel, making an odd ‘tutting’ sound, and stalked back to her seat. Dumbledore returned to the lectern and declared the beginning of the feast. The appearance of food on the tables seemed enough to draw the hall’s attention away from Harry for a moment, and he used it to take his usual seat across from Ron and Hermione.

“What happened to you, Harry!? Where have you been!?” Hermione demanded the second he sat down, leaning low over the table, no interest in her food whatever.

“Later. I promise. I can’t say it here.” She swallowed but nodded acquiescence. Then her gaze flickered to the left.

“Umbridge is coming. Harry, she’s the worst! She’s the one behind the Anti-Werewolf legislation, and now she’s here to spy on Dumbledore for Fudge and…”

“I know. Just follow my lead,” he hissed back.

“Please be careful!”

He leaned back and smirked before grabbing a plate of steak and potatoes.

“When am I ever _not_ careful?”

Ron snorted into his plate.

* * *

**_One month ago…_ **

“What do you know of Goblin History, Harry Potter?” Ragnok the Goblin asked as he led Harry and Daphne down a torchlit corridor deep beneath Gringotts. He was… possibly the oddest thing Harry had ever seen. And that was saying something. He was a foot taller than the other Goblins Harry had met and wore a kind of hybridisation of a muggle tuxedo and full plate armour, all solid gold. Strapped to his back was a jagged broadsword almost as long as Harry was tall.

“Um… not a lot, I’m sorry. Just what Professor Binns has assigned for homework, and he only ever talks about Goblin Rebellions.”

Harry only noticed Daphne shaking her head once the words were already out of his mouth.

Ragnok snorted.

“Rebellions. Pathetic. We did not rebel. To rebel implies servitude, and we have never served wizards in anything, despite what they may like to tell you.”

“Sorry.”

“The fault is not yours, Harry Potter, but with the system itself. Pah! I digress.”

They came to a stop outside a blank wall between two flickering braziers.

“The _Khazûdular_ are _carickasul_ , but they do have some decent ideas,” the goblin grumbled, and Harry raised an eyebrow.

_‘The Dwarves,’_ Daphne mouthed to him, and he nodded his understanding. Even he knew that the Dwarves and Goblins hated each other’s guts.

Ragnok placed a bony hand on the wall, and a thick circular metal door grew out of the marble.

“Wizarding history teaches that the Goblin race was created by accident some two thousand years ago,” Ragnok continued, moving to fiddle with several metal fixtures on the door Harry assumed were locking mechanisms.

“This, as with most things wizards teach, is a lie. We Goblins lived here long before humans first learned the gift of magic, and have been fighting the _Khazûdular_ for just as long. Over the millennia, our wars with the Dwarves have been forced to evolve. With open warfare no longer a viable tactic, we have been forced to, _expand,_ our assaults against the enemy.”

The door made a long groaning sound, then began to creek open. Ragnok stepped inside and punched a section of wall, causing a dozen braziers to illuminate within.

“Our enemy is obsessed with artifacts of the ancient world; when gods and elves still walked the _arda_. So, we do all that is in our power to retrieve them first.”

To Harry’s mind, that just screamed ‘dick move’, but, given Ragnok was now shooting them a murderous grin, baring his three-inch golden teeth, he wisely refrained from voicing the thought.

“Holy Merlin,” Daphne breathed. The vault was not full of gold as Harry had expected. Instead, racks of weapons lined the walls, and the centre of the room was dominated by rows of glass cases, all filled with pieces of elegant and intricate jewellery. It was… it was utterly _magnificent_.

“Rarely have we actually found the relics of the Second and Third Ages that we seek,” Ragnok said. “Most of the ancient elven devices lost their power when the last of the Eldar left our shores, and most of the old dwarf holds remain lost or destroyed. Artifacts built by men, however, are far more common. This vault contains Gringotts’ collection of human-made relics sourced from expeditions of the lands around what is now Britain and Scandinavia.

“As recompense for our gross incompetence concerning your finances, and the major losses you have suffered, I will permit you to take _one_ artifact of your choice from this vault. Only one. You would be the first wizard permitted to do so since Isla Black in 1860. She gave the device she took, the Ring of Barahir, to Ulysses S Grant, her muggle husband’s brother-in-law, which he used to win the American Civil War.”

Harry swallowed. Now _that_ was what they should probably be learning in history.

“The Ring of Barahir?” Daphne squeaked. “You had _that_!”

Ragnok shrugged. “Many objects have passed through this vault, Miss Greengrass. I believe even Excalibur itself rested here at one point before it was shattered.”

Harry finally managed to reclaim his voice.

“Thank you, truly… this is… it’s an incredible gift, sir.”

“It is what you are owed, Harry Potter. No more, no less.”

He supposed it was, given what he and Daphne had just spent the day learning. Not only had Dumbledore arranged to have a group of Gringotts goblins intercept all of Harry’s mail from the bank, but they were also seizing all mail sent to him by everyone except Hedwig herself. Even Ron and Hermione’s letters, apparently, were being intercepted before being passed on. Ragnok had rather flatly informed them that 52 goblins involved in the plot had been executed, and all their property confiscated. Harry had put his foot down at that rather immediately and told Ragnok to give the families their possessions back. The banker had looked thoroughly confused for several minutes before acquiescing. Daphne hadn’t seemed very happy either, but he refused to blame a family for the crimes of a single member. If he did that, he’d be the biggest hypocrite in the known universe.

All the mail had been hidden in a secret vault, and Griphook and Snaptooth had taken him and Daphne to inspect the contents. He’d nearly had a heart attack as they read out the inventory.

Letters numbering in the tens of thousands had been discarded in piles towering from floor to ceiling. Notes from well-wishers in the aftermath of Voldemort’s defeat, invitations from every Magical School in the world; requests from both professional Quidditch scouts _and_ high-profile defence institutions; various gifts and packages sent from families rich and poor for his birthdays, and Christmases. Furthermore, 1152 guardianship requests from wizarding families willing to take him in after his parents’ deaths, ranging from close friends of his mother and father to known servants of Voldemort. To take the cake, close to one hundred betrothal requests had also been there, all spontaneously combusting when Harry had agreed to marry Daphne.

But the part that had Harry wanting to march up to Hogwarts and demand answers right now had been the fifty-two outstanding Wills naming him their beneficiaries after their families had been wiped out by the Death Eaters. Including his mother’s best friend. And because Harry hadn’t opened any of them within the fifteen years since their recipient’s death, all but one (which would have expired in two weeks) had been repossessed by the fucking Ministry of Magic. Harry would be the first person to admit he was no genius, but he was smart enough to figure out why Dumbledore had allowed that. Mr Weasley’s budget, for example, had probably just received quite the boost in funding.

He’d sworn to himself as he stared up at the piles of mail, that he would go through it all, and answer every single fucking piece.

Ragnok walked deeper into the vault of relics, and if it were possible, Harry’s jaw would have hit the floor. There were legendary swords and axes and daggers galore… Suits of glowing plate armour, and hundreds of necklaces imbued with every fertility and beauty-based enchantment known to Wizardkind. Harry decided he wouldn’t touch any of those without a barge pole.

Interestingly, the one thing the vault didn’t have were any wands. Staffs yes, but no wands. They were, Ragnok explained, a relatively new invention, so calling one an ‘ancient relic’ was a bit generous. Harry didn’t think a 1000-year-old wand would have been much to slouch about, but once again, decided pissing of the goblin was not a good idea.

But Ragnok ignored all the weapons, instead stopping beside a glass case at the back of the room. He opened it, reached in, and pulled out a magnificent ring. A thin band of a white and silver alloy he’d never seen before, with a gleaming diamond cut into the shape of a lily in the setting.

“This item came into the possession of Gringotts during the Spanish Inquisition. One of the few surviving Rings of Power, built by the Ancient Greek Wizards in an attempt to replicate the lost elven rings of ages long passed.”

Daphne sucked in a breath, moving closer.

“That’s _mithril_ , isn’t it?”

Ragnok’s grin grew even wider.

“Indeed. You must understand, there are very few of these devices left, and giving one away is nigh unthinkable. Most of them faded not long after their creation, for their forgers did not understand that the Elven Rings of Power they were trying to emulate were never intended as weapons. Archimedes, the Greek mathematician, determined that, if he were to bind the power of divinity to a specific intent, he could manifest it fully in this world. He succeeded, creating this ring and two others like it.”

He offered the ring to Harry, who hesitantly took it from the goblins wrinkled hand. It had no weight to it that Harry could feel, though the metal was cold to the touch.

“This is not a weapon, Harry Potter. And if you try to use it for offensive ends, you will hasten its end. Its power lies in preservation and healing. With this, your friend Ginevra Weasley should survive her blood malediction.”

Harry swallowed, the true nature of the gift finally dawning on him. This would save Ginny’s life.

“Thank you.”

* * *

**_Now…_ **

A shadow fell over Harry’s frame, and he paused in his eating.

“Madame Umbridge I presume?” He asked without looking up. Instead, his gaze was locked on Daphne across the hall. The entirety of Slytherin house was avoiding her like the plague, leaving her utterly alone. A ring of empty seats around her. She caught his eye and shrugged.

Going back to Slytherin had been an enormous risk, especially with Voldemort having returned. But she’d refused to sit on the sidelines. Even so, he wished she had the ring with her, but Ginny was still too weak to go without it. While she’d healed incredibly well, even the powerful magical artifact hadn’t the ability to cure the Blood Curse she’d contracted in Azkaban. As a result, her skin remained far paler than it should be, her eyes a burnt copper that matched her hair instead of chocolate brown. More dangerous was the effect the curse bore on her immune system. It was utterly wrecked, leaving her dangerously exposed should she contract even the weakest of muggle diseases. Without the ring she now bore, she’d barely be able to walk outside during the daylight hours.

Daphne’s runes should protect her from what was undoubtedly coming in the Slytherin Common Room tonight, and he’d just have to trust her. She had the _stele_. That would have to do.

Because it was in Slytherin House that the plan would begin in earnest. One year. That was how long they’d calculated it would take for Voldemort to retore his forces to a level he was comfortable with. That meant Harry, Daphne and Ginny had one year to plan and execute a magical revolution.

No pressure.

“Mr Potter, you are under arrest on the orders of the Minister for Magic!”

Subtle this one.

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Harry said, spearing a piece of steak with his knife and biting it.

“You… You broke into Azkaban prison, violated the law restricting underage sorcery, and freed a violent murderer!!!”

A collective gasp rang through the hall, and Umbridge flinched.

Oops. That wasn’t supposed to be public knowledge.

“Wow,” Harry said with his mouth full. “A fifteen-year-old wizard broke into Azkaban prison, rescued a prisoner, and escaped, all without being detected or caught. That must have been quite the story, hey Ron!” He shot the redhead a meaningful glance, and Ron coughed several times before taking a hurried sip of pumpkin juice and answering.

“Oh yeah. Definitely. What are you going to do next summer, Harry? Tame a dragon and fly to Asgard?”

Hermione, never one to be slow on the uptake, jumping in enthusiastically.

“Oh, that’s an excellent idea! I have to write that up for the Boy-Who-Lived book authors. They did so love my script for the last book: The Boy-Who-Lived and the Tower of Doom. I’m pretty sure that was a best-seller, wasn’t it?”

“Just missed the top spot in children’s fiction last year to that Demigod book. Though I can’t really complain, those books are outstanding,” Harry agreed, swallowing the steak.

“Stop this foolishness at once! Now, come with me at once, or I’ll call the Aurors.”

Harry placed his fork down on the table and finally turned to look at the toad-faced woman.

“Okay then. Foolishness aside. If I’m as formidable as you say and can infiltrate the most feared magical prison in Europe, how did you plan to detain me?” He raised an eyebrow at her and was rewarded with the colour red creeping up her neck and clashing horribly with her pink velvet blouse.

“Did you have an army of Dementors? Because those didn’t seem to stop me. Or a force of Aurors? I had to have gotten past them if I’d broken into Azkaban, hadn’t I? Or perhaps you have an advanced magical trap, like the shields and defences surrounding the prison, for me to breakthrough?”

Umbridge opened her mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. Then stormed off.

_That_ had gone about as well as he’d expected.

“So, um, Harry?” Neville asked from a few seats down.

“Yeah, Nev?”

“Did you actually break into Azkaban?”

Harry grinned.

“Totally. It was actually super easy. I can walk you through it if you’d like.”

Cue the explosion of questions shouted from all directions. And as he narrated fighting off the Dementors, he glanced towards Dumbledore, who was watching him with a calculating expression. So, he raised his goblet of Pumpkin juice to the old man and winked.

If someone had told him being Slytherin was this much fun, he’d have begged the hat to send him to the snakes.

* * *

**_Not a lot of Daphne in this chapter, but don’t worry. She’ll be the main POV for the next chapter._ **

**_A quick question; did you guys want Jessica to appear? Gemini Curse alumni will know who I’m talking about, but for those of you who don’t, Jessica Jones is an OC Slytherin character inspired by the MARVEL Comics character of the same name we introduced as a friend for Ginny, Astoria and Luna. She plays a major role in Gemini Curse and has a backstory deeply connected with the Zodiac Runes._ **


	3. Chapter 3

# Three

The second Daphne stepped into the Slytherin Common Room; she was grabbed on both sides and pulled off her feet. She forced herself to remember her lessons, counting to five in her head as she was dragged down the stairs and into the centre of the circular room. Draco and his gang were standing around a particularly comfortable looking black leather armchair, arms folded, expressions a mixture between smug and angry. The two seventh years shoved her down on her knees in front of Malfoy, and one of them kicked her in the back for good measure.

It was only thanks to her runes that she didn’t scream in terror. The Pisces Rune on her left forearm ensured her mind remained sharp and focussed on the problem at hand, granting her the mental fortitude to stay on mission and not retreat in fear. The Aries Rune ensured her skin was tougher than it should be, more durable. Despite the manhandling, she had not a single bruise on her body. Finally, her Virgo Rune – meticulously drawn and preprepared – would ensure she remained looking like she’d just stepped off the cover of _Witch Weekly_ , no matter what happened to her.

They would all wear off in a few hours, leaving her with the biggest migraine humanly possible, but the marks were the only way she survived the next ten minutes.

“Draco; still an arrogant git I see,” Daphne sneered, pulling herself upright, refusing to show an inch of fear. This had to go perfectly, or their plans would be pushed back months…

“You’ve got some serious nerve coming back here Greengrass. My father has given us all very implicit instructions on what to do should Potter’s whore come back into…”

She spat at him, a glob of spittle landing square on his nose.

The Malfoy heir was so utterly shocked by her action he didn’t even wipe the spit away for about five seconds. Then, watching as his brain caught up with reality, his face blew up like a giant tomato.

“You fucking slut!” He wiped his face with his sleeve and reached for his wand.

Daphne, cheating, was much faster on the draw.

Eleven inches of apple-wood were in his face before his wand left his pocket.

“Choose your next words carefully, Draco. I suppose it’s too much to ask for you to think for yourself, and I have no intention of listening to you prattle off a preprepared script from old Luci. So, unless you’ve got a message from someone for me, I will be taking over this conversation. Anything intelligent to say?”

Malfoy’s eyes crossed as he tried to fixate on Daphne’s wand point. On either side of him, Crabbe and Goyle shifted nervously. The rune on her lower back tingled, and Daphne instinctively _knew_ to move her head just slightly to the right.

A disarming charm flew past her ear and hit Goyle in his flat, stupid face. He squawked, then fell flat on his ass. Instantly, everyone standing around the outside of the room started whispering, and Daphne suppressed a grin. How many years had she wasted trying to be unnoticeable? Cultivating a personality of being unapproachable and distant? Of being scared of Draco, and the kids on Lucius Malfoy’s payroll?

No more. She was a new woman. Harry had taught her how to stand up for herself. Proven that the Pureblood way wasn’t the only way forward. Shown her a future worth _believing_ in.

* * *

**_One week ago…_ **

Harry had to all but _drag_ Daphne out of the cinema on Oxford Street. That was how utterly stunned she was after one and a half hours that had fundamentally changed her understanding of not only the muggle world worked, but the universe in its entirety.

“The muggles can _time-travel!!!!!”_ She exclaimed to her chaperone as they stepped out onto the crowded streets of London. Thousands of people bustled around, each one existing in their own independent worlds, Daphne and Harry may as well not have existed at all. The variety of clothes (and the cuts and shapes! She’d never seen shorts that small or shirts with sleeves that ballooned out like that!) was astonishing. And _SHOES!!!!_ Daphne thought she might have just died and gone to heaven when she saw just how many different types of shoes one could buy in the fantastical realm known only as _The Gap_.

Harry burst out laughing, and Daphne immediately flushed in embarrassment. She’d probably said that a bit too loud.

“No, Daph. They can’t time-travel.”

Daphne blinked. Then she blinked again.

“But we just _saw_ the Doctor and Marty use that machine to go back to 1955. You can’t tell me that wasn’t real! I’ve seen Pensieve memories just as clear!”

Harry coughed several times in an attempt to stop his laughing, and Daphne stamped her foot in annoyance.

“Harry! Why are you laughing!? This is… if the muggles can time-travel, how can we stay secret!”

“They… they _can’t_ time-travel Daphne. It’s called a movie. It’s fake,” he finally spat out, taking a sip of the coke he’d bought, then grabbing the now-empty bucket of popcorn hanging limply in Daphne’s left hand.

“Fake?”

“Yeah. Muggles use cameras and actors to create them. They’re like… like the portraits at Hogwarts. If all the paintings had a script they needed to follow and were real people, and actually playing roles instead of being memories of people and… ok so not like moving portraits at all really.”

Daphne tried to move her mouth and voice her displeasure at having been duped, but she couldn’t get more than a pathetic croaking noise to leave her lips. Harry threw the coke and popcorn into a nearby trashcan and guided her out of the flow of traffic leaving the theatre. They walked along the sun-lit streets of London, Harry pointing out several different shops to her, and even explaining that there was a system of _underground_ trains at the bottom of the various and seemingly random staircases going down into the ground. He’d asked if she wanted to see them, but she’d shook her head in vehement denial.

It… it was too much.

So many people… more than she’d ever seen in Diagon Alley or the few Wizarding villages her father had taken her to.

The clothes… Even the outfit Harry had given her, just jeans and a t-shirt, was so different from what she’d spent the last sixteen years of her life wearing. She assumed they’d belonged to Granger, judging by Daphne’s need to quickly use an extension charm whilst changing into them, as the bookish girl was nowhere near as developed as she was. 

It was like wearing someone else’s skin. But it wasn’t _bad_ , or mundane. In fact, Daphne found she quite liked being able to show off, and if the glances Harry had been sending her way were any indication, he enjoyed it too.

Then there was how ­ _advanced_ everything was. Flashing neon lights proclaiming that she should buy this drink or shop at this store. Thousands of cars and buses driving down the roads. Electric streetlights on every corner. There were even these things that Harry called ‘phones’, muggle wands that allowed you to talk to people over great distances; and could connect to an invisible ‘cloud’ to access every library in the world, instantly. And they fit in your _pocket_.

Daphne had never considered herself a blood-supremacist. She wasn’t a radical anything. But seeing how far the muggles had gone without them, and how she and her family and everyone else she’d ever known had looked down on them for no real reason. Genuinely believing that they were better than the muggles without ever bothering to check if that was actually true…

They turned a corner, and Daphne ground to a halt. A collection of people were crowding the plaza ahead, waving signs made from cardboard with colourful phrases emblazoned across them. And all of them were shouting; crying out in unison things that Daphne didn’t understand.

“Oh, cool. Protesters,” Harry said, nodding to himself.

“Protesters?”

Harry turned to face her, then squeezed her hand.

“Activists; ordinary people campaigning for change.”

Daphne glanced down at her hand. When had Harry taken it? She couldn’t remember grabbing his hand.

“Come on.”

Harry led her towards the crowd of people, and Daphne let herself be pulled along. Enraptured, in a way, by the magnetism of them. 

A young woman, a few years older than Daphne, noticed them approaching and stopped chanting, shooting them a welcoming smile. She had short-cropped blonde hair, accentuated by red highlights to create a sunset-like effect.

“Want to join? We’ve got plenty of spare signs.”

“What are you protesting?” Harry asked, keeping a reassuring grip on Daphne’s hand.

“Equal rights; equal pay.”

Daphne had no idea what that meant. Thankfully, Harry guessed as much and explained for her.

“Women’s rights. Right to pay equal to a man’s, right to equal representation. That sort of thing.”

Daphne’s eyes widened.

“You’re just… out here on the street _demanding_ people pay you better?” she whispered in awe.

The woman looked utterly dumbfounded by Daphne’s shock, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. That was what broke the hippogriff’s back. She spent the next hour asking the perplexed woman all the questions she could think of. Perhaps the most shocking news she learned was that not only could women vote on the muggle Wizengamot, but they’d been doing so for almost a hundred years.

There was a whole world right under her eyes, and Daphne Greengrass, soon to be Daphne Potter, wanted to see it _all_.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

“I am a daughter of the House of Greengrass,” Daphne said, keeping her voice level all the while pushing as much emphasis and authority into it as she could.

“And soon to be a daughter of the House of Potter. Ancestral lines that go back generations. Families steeped in magic old and new, wonderous and mundane.”

This was not a Daphne anyone was used to seeing. She was supposed to be aloof at worst, shy at best. Always staying to the sidelines, focussing on her studies. Never sticking out. Daphne spotted at least a dozen people who took steps away from her. She wasn’t sure whether it was her voice, the Virgo illusion, or her own conviction, but seeing that was like fuelling her with the pure Light of Will.

“And that means something to a lot of people. Both in this room and in our world out there. If you dare lay a hand on me, I will call to arms all the resources at my disposal to utterly destroy you and yours.”

At the very back of the room, she spotted Tracey and Astoria. Tracey was watching her with a slack jaw. Astoria gave her twin thumbs up.

“But while that matters to most of us, to Malfoy, it means absolutely nothing.”

The Pisces Rune thrummed against her forearm, and Daphne – heart hammering in her chest – stood atop Malfoy’s armchair and lowered her wand from his face. She had everyone’s attention now.

“Most of you probably know already, and those that don’t will soon. He Who Must Not Be Named has returned.”

As Daphne had assumed, the number of gasps here was decidedly lacking. Harry had guessed as much. Either You-Know-Who had already reached out to many of his old associates, or the Death Eaters from the Graveyard had spread the word through the Pureblood circles.

“The last time he rose up, he put our entire way of life at risk. He used us, the sons and daughters of ancient and noble houses of magic, as pawns in his army. How many of us have parents locked up in Azkaban or lying six-feet-under, because of You-Know-Who?”

There was no cheering, only muted whispering as Daphne gave voice to the underlying fear running through Slytherin House. Many of these people, her friends, were just as she had been only a month or so before. Ignorant of what lay beyond their world. A world that taught the inferiority of muggles and non-magical people. Someone like You-Know-Who, with grand ideas and endless charisma, could weaponize that ignorance and turn it into fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of the enemy.

She had come up with the idea for this, her own weaponization of fear, based on something Harry had said to her in passing.

_‘People say Dumbledore is the only thing Voldemort ever feared. Well, I call bull-shit on that. I know Voldemort. Maybe better than anyone. He only fears one thing. Death.’_

Daphne agreed with the Dark Lord on that account. Death _was_ terrifying.

Much more terrifying than a phantom enemy you’ve never seen before.

“I don’t plan on ending up in a grave or a cell any time soon all for some muggles that don’t know about us and wouldn’t care if they did. You-Know-Who, Malfoy and his cronies just want to use us to get rich and make themselves feel justified. That’s Slytherin to the core. What’s not Slytherin, is acting like sheep and following them like good little soldiers, or hiding in the corner and hoping you can’t get involved.”

Daphne swallowed, then stepped off the couch.

“I made my choice. I started living up to the ideals of Slytherin House, and to my family name. _That_ is why I sided with Potter, why I agreed to marry him. Potter almost killed You-Know-Who as a bloody _baby,_ and we’ve all seen what he’s done at here at the school. I’m placing my chips on Harry killing him again.”

She started walking towards her dorm room, trying very hard to keep the smile off her face as the crowd parted for her like the Red Sea. Malfoy couldn’t even manage the balls to shout after her.

That had gone _perfectly_.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Dobby the House Elf apparated Ginny into Grimmauld Place, then instantly held a conjured bucket in front of her. The second her feet hit the ground, she collapsed to her knees and vomited her guts out into the cold metal.

Her head spun, thoughts blurring in and out, in and out, until finally her stomach settled, and she managed to blink away the spots in her eyes.

_Un._

_Deux._

_Trois._

_Quatre._

_Cinq…_

A dark hallway lit by gas candles. Skulls on the walls. A screaming painting obscured by curtains. Flapping curtains. Curtains like…

_Un._

_Deux._

_Trois._

_Quatre._

_Cinq…_

She threw up again.

Two men came running down the nearby stairs shouting at the painting and blasting it with spells. Finally, it fell silent, and the curtains stopped moving.

Only then could she manage the presence of mind to stand up.

“Thank you, Dobby,” Ginny whispered.

She couldn’t speak properly yet. Her voice box was both too unused to speech and too comfortable with screaming.

“Who the hell are you?!” the men demanded.

Trembling, his voice cracking like a whip and threatening to send her back into… into…

_Un._

_Deux._

_Trois._

_Quatre._

_Cinq…_

She handed the closest man – Lupin, as her Harry had described him – a piece of paper.

_The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix is located at Number 12 Grimmauld Place._

“How’d you get this? Who are you?” Lupin demanded again. Ginny instead found the eyes of the second man. Tall, tattooed, with scraggly black hair.

Eyes that matched the ones she saw in the mirror. Haunted. Dead. Passionless.

“Ginny Weasley,” Sirius Black breathed, and Ginny flinched. That wasn’t her name. Not anymore. His wand fell to the ground with a dull clatter, then he was on his knees, pulling her into a hug.

Ginny melted into his arms. Desperate for contact. The ring on her finger, white and silver, with a sparkling setting in the shape of a lily, pulsed, drawing power from the connection. Ginny’s fogged mind cleared a little more.

Her Harry’s hugs were better. They sent shivers down her spine and made heat pool in every part of her body, mind and soul. But Sirius Black wasn’t bad at it either. Though, Ginny thought ruefully, she didn’t have much to compare it too. She couldn’t remember what her mother’s hugs felt like. The Dementors had taken that memory long ago.

“I had to come,” she told him, speaking as loud as her raw throat would allow. “Have to…”

She broke into a fit of coughing, and she clenched her fist as she swallowed the flehm that attempted to rise up.

“I’m so sorry,” Sirius exclaimed, rubbing her back. It was… nice. Comforting. Had her father once done something similar?

“For what?”

“I left you there when I escaped. If I’d have known…”

Unbidden, a memory rose to the forefront of her mind. A memory of a shaggy, emaciated black dog stopping outside her cell in Azkaban, only a few weeks after she’d arrived there.

“Not your fault.”

“Sirius? You know this girl?” Lupin asked, kneeling beside them. He’d put away his wand.

Good. This was why she’d come.

Sirius carried her downstairs into a warm kitchen and placed her in an armchair by the fire. She was small, weak, and fragile. Moving her was so easy an infant could probably do it.

“Can I get you anything, Mistress Ginny?” Dobby asked softly from her side. The elf had decided it was his personal responsibility to care for Ginny’s every desire. Harry had forbidden him from harming himself, so this was his self-imposed penance for… for…

A shadowed cave, dripping walls. The slithering of a monster as its scales slid along water slick tiles. Hatred unbounded. Forever and eternal…

_Un._

_Deux._

_Trois._

_Quatre._

_Cinq…_

“Tea, please,” she whispered, and Dobby popped away.

“Ginny?” Sirius asked again, and the ring beat to his words. “Why are you here? Did Harry send you?”

She shook her head.

“Why? If Dumbledore or one of the Order members comes, you’ll be in big trouble.”

Ginny scanned Sirius’s body. He had spent far longer in Azkaban than she had, and even with two years free, he still carried a weathered, beaten down aura about him, though he’d clearly done a great deal to reverse his physical degradation.

She looked down at the ring on her hand.

“Light heals the soul,” she whispered. Then, closing her eyes, she took the cool metal band and slid it off her finger.

Instantly, her breathing became harder, more laborious with each rise and fall. A weight pressed into each one of limbs, a sluggishness permeating her movements. The fog on her mind descended in force, and just thinking became hard.

_Un._

_Deux._

_Trois._

_Quatre._

_Cinq…_

Why did she do that? The pretty girl had taught her. Her Harry’s friend. With the long blonde hair, and the soft pillows. What was her name?

She held out the ring to Sirius.

“Will, heal, wolf,” she croaked. The ring had told her this. It was why she’d come. The voice inside, _Lifelight_ , purged what did not belong. Restored to one’s true self. Ginny was too broken to fix. Sirius Black too. Broken. But a man of two minds… Not broken. Healable.

Sirius gasped, catching her meaning. Which was good, because that was all she had left.

Dobby brought her tea and wet cloths and little sandwiches as she sat in the chair for the next several hours. She drifted in and out of sleep, in and out and in and out and in and out and in and out and…

And in her ears echoed howling screams from deep below.

* * *

Next up, Harry confronts Gryffindor Tower... and Dumbledore.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *It has been brought to my attention that there was an error in chapter two. A Gemini Curse reader pointed out that Harry should only have three runic charges, not seven. I’ve gone back and made the necessary corrections. Not sure where that came from. Daphne only has three in the last chapter… I might have been drunk at the time. Fun fact, half of Ginny’s sequences out of phase in Gemini Curse were written whilst I was totally piss-drunk. Good times…

#  _Four_

**_Now…_ **

Remus slumped against the shredded wallpaper of the Grimmauld Place cellar; throat utterly hoarse as he gasped for ragged breaths.

He was a free man.

There was no feeling or sensation of freedom. No euphoria of being of his own mind for the first time since he was a child. But he _knew_. In his bones, he knew.

The darkness he’d carried within was gone.

His hands were covered in blood, and enormous gashes crisscrossed his body, all of them throbbing with a dull and aching pain. There was wetness dripping from his ears and nose, and his head wanted to rip itself in two.

It was nothing compared to the pain of the wolf.

A pain he’d never have to feel again.

In a sort of daze, Remus looked down at his right hand, and the ring Ginny Weasley had brought to him. Not a single drop of blood marred the beautiful white steel, and the diamond setting was glowing softly with an inner light. It pulsed softly on his hand, a rhythm he could barely hear. Or perhaps he wasn’t hearing it at all, but feeling it echo through his very soul.

Even as he sat, mesmerised, the gashes across his abdomen where the wolf had tried to tear itself free, where he’d ripped himself apart in the agony of the transformation, were knitting themselves closed. Tiny wisps of white light rolled off his skin as, scar by scar, his wounds faded away. The wolf, exorcised, was taking its blood battered and agonising marks with it.

He could already feel his mind clearing, the aches in his bones he’d carried for so long easing away. Even the headache was dying away.

It was true. Miracles really did exist. He’d never be forced to change ever again.

“Moony?” Sirius called from outside the steel-reinforced door to the basement. “You stopped bashing the shit out of everything? Is it over? Did it work?”

“Yes!” Remus yelled, then froze. A puff of the white smoke had fled his lips as he spoke, and his throat hadn’t even hurt forming the words. His heart rate was going down, and almost all his open wounds had already healed. He glanced at the ring again. What in Merlin’s name was this thing? And where had the girl – an Azkaban escapee who looked barely healthy enough to stand – gotten it?

Sirius unlocked the numerous bolts of metal, then entered the basement. The first thing he saw, obviously, were the puddles of blood on the floor and talon marks clawing the walls, but to his credit, he didn’t puke, instead rushing to Remus’ side.

“It worked,” he breathed. “It actually worked. It’s over… it’s _gone._ ”

Sirius stared at Remus with wide, stunned eyes, watching as the largest of the scars on his upper chest vanished into his skin. A miracle.

“Holy crap, Moony. That’s fucking _amazing!!!_ ”

A tiny pop disturbed the incredulity of the moment, and Sirius spun around to see Kreacher appear behind them.

“The other elf, the traitor elf who had the _privilege_ of serving a pure house and…”

“What about Dobby?” Sirius snapped at the knarred elf, and Kreacher growled low in his throat.

“The traitor elf is slamming his head into the walls of my mistress’s house and disturbing the mistress and the artifacts. Make him stop.”

Sirius frowned, but stood up and offered a hand to Remus, who took it with renewed strength. A strength he hadn’t felt in a long, _long_ time.

“You sure you’re alright?” Sirius asked again as he grabbed Remus’ clothes from where he’d left them in the corner and threw them towards him.

“Yeah. Better than alright. I feel better than I have in a decade. Maybe more. I…” 

He trailed off mid-sentence because something had just _whispered_ into his head.

_‘The burned one. She weakens. Hurry, Son of Valour.’_

A voice, feminine, like a waterfall trickling on a peaceful spring morning. He’d never felt anything like it before. The wolf within had only growled or screamed, and only ever in the moments before or after his transformations. This was so utterly different he had to resist the urge to swoon at its touch on his mind. It was _beautiful_.

_‘The burned one!’_

The burned one? Who was… Dobby, bashing his head into a wall. Ginny Weasley, dead on her feet.

In a panic, he looked down at the ring, which was pulsing far stronger and more insistent than before. He took off like an arrow, bolting up the stairs without even bothering to dress himself. Instead, he barrelled past the portrait of Sirius’ screaming mother as his best friend yelled from behind.

_‘Quickly!’_

Following the thudding sounds of a house elf’s skull impacting wood, Remus shoved open the door the room Hermione had used over the summer. Sure enough, lying on the made bed was the girl, Ginny. Her chest was barely rising, and her unnaturally pale skin was flushed dark red around her eyes and lips. Her brow was soaked from sweat, wisps of dull auburn hair clinging to the skin.

Dobby had closed the curtains, changed the girl’s clothes, charmed the room to be ice-cold, and placed ice-packs around her, but none of it seemed to be working. The few, weak breathes she took were thin and wheezed.

Remus grabbed the elf and spun him around.

“What’s wrong with her?!”

Dobby’s enormous eyes were bloodshot, tears dripping down his face. The nurses uniform he wore – which on a male house-elf was certainly odd – was also dripping wet, but Remus assumed that was from the elf’s enormous tears.

“Dobby tells Mistress Ginny not to go to wolfman. That blood-curse will reclaim her if she takes off Mr Harry Potter’s ring. But she didn’t listen to Dobby. Wanted to help the wolfman.”

Remus breath caught in his throat. An active blood-malediction. Those were almost always terminal. The treatments you needed…

In a fervour, he ripped the ring off his finger, and the world around him seemed to dull. The rhythm vanished, and his remaining scars stopped healing. Sirius came barrelling up the stairs.

“Moony, what the hell…” He cut himself off, watching as Remus dropped to his knees beside Ginny’s bed and slipped the ring back on her finger. The white band pulsed once, and Ginny released a long, arduous breath, white smoke escaping her red lips.

“Holy Hannah,” Remus breathed.

_‘Thank you, Son of Valour,’_ the voice muttered, before fading from his mind.

* * *

**_Now, Hogwarts…_ **

Harry finally got a moment to break away from the crowd of students dragging him up to Gryffindor Tower when everyone had to stop and wait in line to squeeze through the portrait of the Fat Lady.

So, he took his chance. He grabbed Hermione and Ron by the shoulders and yanked them around a corner and behind a tapestry into a small corridor devoid of paintings, with only a fraction of low light to see by.

“Bloody hell,” Ron muttered, knocking Harry’s hand away.

“Start talking, Harry,” Hermione demanded. “Now.”

“I broke into Azkaban,” Harry said, relieved to _finally_ be out of the spotlight.

“We had gathered that,” Hermione said flatly.

“Yes, but what you probably don’t know is that I rescued Ginny.” Ron froze, colour draining from his face as Hermione flinched.

“She’s in bad shape; a half dozen different illnesses, including a blood curse that’s eating up her nervous system. The Goblins gave me something to help her, but it’s only a stop-gap measure. It can’t cure her.”

“Goblins don’t give anything away for free, Harry,” Hermione told him, slipping into her lecturer’s voice. “What did you promise them?”

“NothingNothing. They were in my debt, the device cleared it.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a piece of parchment with a sketch on it, which he handed to Hermione.

“I looked through the Greengrass family library but couldn’t find anything. Your research skills are lightyears ahead of mine Mione, and I need your help.”

“Okay but…”

“The Goblin who gave the ring to me said there were two others like it, but they weren’t in the Gringotts Vault. See if you can find a reference to something that resembles that drawing in ancient lore. Ragnok said they were made by someone called Archimedes if that helps. I want to know as much about this thing as possible, and if I can, find the other two.”

“Alright, but Harry, how were the Goblins in your debt?”

Harry shivered just thinking about it. Regardless, he explained to them both how Daphne had realised someone had been intercepting his mail and the depths of Dumbledore’s crimes. Hermione and Ron were a good audience. Oohing and ahhing and gasping at the right moments, but the real kicker came when he explained the fan mail.

“Mountains of the stuff; I’m not even joking. Letters written in crayon from kids who’d read those adventure books, others from parents – those ones were kind of creepy. And get this, they weren’t just to me.”

“What do you mean?” Ron asked, brows furrowed.

“There were plenty of stacks sent to all _three_ of us.”

“WHAT?!”

Harry had a good chuckle at their astonished faces.

“Oh yeah. There was a clear split between older students and younger ones – I’m thinking siblings of kids who heard the stories second hand – but they all run along the same lines. ‘Harry, can you teach me how to slay a dragon?’ ‘Hermione, can you tell me how to study better so I can be smart like you?’ ‘Ron, how are you so handsome?’ They go, on and on and on.”

Ron stepped back into the wall, jaw hanging open like a broken hinge. Hermione’s face was utterly red.

“There were even some nudes. Not gonna lie, certainly an eye-opener…”

“Harry!” Hermione hissed, slapping him on the arm. He laughed again and patted her shoulder sympathetically.

“There were also invites, Hermione,” he continued, humour bleeding out of his voice. “I’ve spent hours combing through everything since I found out. You’ve got invites from other magical schools, we all got invites to do media interviews, and I received messages from a half dozen Quidditch Scouts. Ron, the International Chess League sent you a formal invitation. At the end of _first year!_ The youngest person ever invited.”

Ron was grabbing the wall now, hyperventilating something fierce. Hermione looked like she might fall over.

“But that’s not the worst part.”

“What could be worse than that?” Hermione whispered, voice catching.

“The cries for help. Tear-stained letters from children writing to a hero they’d read about in stories and believed was real. Messages that were never answered.” Now it was Harry’s turn to stop for a breath, clenching his hand into a fist to keep it from trembling.

“I investigated some. As many as I could while I was stuck in Greengrass Manor. Found two dead half-bloods – one a suicide, the other buried in a backyard. Reported three muggle-borns who were being beaten by their parents for being magical to the police.”

That broke the camel’s back.

Hermione’s knees buckled, and Ron sprang from the wall to catch her. Together, Harry and Ron lowered her to the ground.

“Oh, God…”

“I did what I could,” he muttered, trying to convince himself as much as them.

They sat like that for a long while, until the quiet chatter from the passing students finally ended.

“Why…” Ron began, but he had to stop to reclaim his voice. When he did speak, his face was dark. Angry.

“Why didn’t you tell us when you found out?”

“You were in the middle of Dumbledore’s fortress all summer,” Harry reminded him. “I couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t intercept letters or have a watch on you. I only got one letter to Sirius using Dobby, but the Headmaster must have found out, because when I tried to send another, the elf couldn’t get through the wards.

“He sent Fawkes to try and nab me as well. It was only the Greengrass Family War Wards that kept me away from him.”

Ron whistled appreciatively. “War wards. Bill told me about those once. They’re heavy-duty. No one except family can…” he stopped, a look of realisation crossing his face. Hermione caught it too.

“That’s why you got engaged,” she muttered through her tears. “To get inside the war wards.”

“Yep.”

Harry took a deep breath, flushing his anger. He couldn’t afford it tonight. He had about an hour of charge left in his runes, and he still had work to do tonight. Glancing out the tapestry to see if the coast was clear, he helped Hermione to her feet and led the two of them slowly up the stairs to the portrait.

The Fat Lady stood closed, with a perturbed look on her face.

“They’re all waiting for you inside,” she said. “Try not to put anyone in the hospital.”

He turned back to Hermione and Ron.

“Whatever happens, are you with me?”

Neither of them hesitated in nodding their affirmation.

“Alright, then. Time to be the Boy-Who-Lived.”

* * *

**Grimmauld Place…**

Sirius sat in his mother’s old laboratory, hastily flipping through the brittle pages of the tome on the desk before him. This book, one of the few he’d saved from Molly’s culling of the Black Library by hiding it in his mother’s secret laboratory, was a text full of the most potent magical curses dating back to the days of Merlin. He hadn’t cared about most of the books. A great many of them certainly deserved destruction, and he was more than happy to see them go. But the Weasley Matriarch hadn’t actually been reading the books or checking them before she burned them. That, he couldn’t allow. This was still his family’s history, and there could be information helpful to Harry inside. So he’d made sure to protect a few tomes. The Black Family had a long history with curses and their counters, and he hoped to find some clues as to the blood malediction Ginny was clearly suffering within them.

_‘Maledictions are perhaps the most dangerous curses known to wizard-kind. So dangerous in fact, that casting them usually splinters the wand of the person attempting it. As a result, human cast maledictions are very rare. It is much more likely to contract a malediction from nature. Specifically, survivors of attacks from highly magical creatures have been known to develop them._

_They come in different forms. Mind maledictions are the most dangerous – these drive men and women insane within hours. In less than a day, the cursed will usually kill themselves in the most destructive manner available to them._

_Blood maledictions are more common, and often form as a result of being exposed to excessive quantities of anti-magic or having one’s magic drained from them. Dementors, Lethifolds and Phoenixes are usually found to inflict this type of wound when attacked directly._

_Physical maledictions are the least common, manifesting as warps in the skin or other physical features. Often caused by magical overload or attacks from Unicorns or Mimi Spirits._

_All maledictions wreak havoc on their bearer’s immune system, leaving them highly vulnerable to other illnesses and injuries. Even the common cold can be deadly. Some medications can ease the pain and make the condition liveable, though many choose the Veil, and I cannot blame them, for regardless of how the original carrier gains the curse, the greatest risk is not to them._

_Because maledictions graft to a being’s very soul, the disease can be passed on to successive generations seemingly at random, and the curse will remain in that person’s line for eternity._

First, Merlin’s saggy left testicle that was horrifying. Second, what the hell was _anti-magic_? He’d never heard of anything like it.

Groaning at the dull aching in his brain that always accompanied reading, he turned the page and was about to read from the horribly short list of treatments when a knock came on the door. Sirius turned around and, upon seeing his cousin, closed the book, grabbed his lantern, and walked up the rickety staircase.

Andromeda stepped back, letting him exit the portrait of Sirius’s great-grandfather and close it behind him.

“Any change?” He asked, hopefully.

Andi shook her head.

“No. I’m sorry, Sirius. That ring is the only thing keeping her alive, and I’m not even sure how it works. What I can say is that if she takes it off for more than a few hours, she will die, less if she’s in sunlight. Her body is now fully reliant on it.”

Sirius shivered.

“Is there anything you can do?” His cousin was the best healer he knew, save perhaps Madame Pomfrey, and the only one he trusted with something like this.

“I can start her on some treatments for maledictions. They should alleviate the pain somewhat, help her gain some coherency. But a recovery won’t be fast, and it won’t be easy.”

Sirius hadn’t been there for Harry. He hadn’t saved this girl from Azkaban, though logically he knew that wasn’t his fault. But he could do this. He could help her now, the girl whom his godson had fought his way into Sirius’ own personal hell to rescue. He would not let her die. Not if he had any option left to him.

“Do what you can. Anything from the Black Library is yours.”

He was about to say more when the floo flared down the hall. Cautiously, he made his way over to it and found himself face to face with a woman he’d never thought he’d see again.

“Sonny?!” He exclaimed, and Sirius mind, rebellious, tired, and fragile, lurched back through the fog of time.

* * *

**_A lifetime ago, Hogwarts Castle, the Marauders’ Sixth Year…_ **

Over the years, to help Moony with his transformations, they’d brought furniture, bedding and sheets into the Shrieking Shack, anything to make him more comfortable. They’d even moved in desks and couches room so James, Sirius and Peter could study (* _gag!_ ) or play card games while waiting for the moon to pass. Once they’d achieved their Animagus transformations, things had been different, but they still used the space. They had a lab for their pranks on the bottom floor, and it was good for conversations best kept away from Filch’s prying ears.

Conversations like this one.

“It’s barbaric,” Lily fumed, pacing the tiny room. Sirius might have been scared of her – Lily _never_ got angry, or at least, she never showed it – if not for the crying Ravenclaw on his arm. But Sonny Breckenridge was sobbing uncontrollably into his robes, so Sirius had more significant problems.

“Arranged marriages have been a part of our culture for thousands of years,” Marlene said, for once lacking her usual chipper air.

“That doesn’t make them right! They were a part of our culture too! We moved on!” Lily snapped, fists clenched at her sides.

“Lily’s right,” James said from his seat by the window sill. No surprise there. Prongs would always…

“But Marlene’s point still stands. Lily, arranged marriages without even asking the son or daughter _are_ wrong. But that doesn’t make all of them bad. You need to remember that. My parents were an arranged marriage, they turned out well.”

Damn, Prongs showing some backbone. _I’m impressed._

Lily spun on James, clearly ready to give him the flaying of his life, when _Remus_ of all people spoke up.

“He’s right Lily. What’s happening to Sonny is horrible and unfair. But it is the law, and it’s not going to change any time soon.”

Lily deflated, collapsing on the couch on the other side of Sonny and dejectedly stroking the blonde girl’s hair.

Now Sirius was even more anxious.

“I just… I just hate it all. All the anger. All the bigotry. I’m seriously considering just going back to the muggle world after I graduate. There’s nothing for me here. I won’t be able to get a job, regardless of the grades I get. All because I don’t have a family tree going back five thousand years.”

James looked like he might have a stroke at that news, so Sirius spoke up before his friend put his foot in his mouth.

“I can’t blame you. But I don’t think you have to leave entirely. France is nowhere near as bad, at least my father was always going on about how ‘uncultured’ they were, so I assume that means they’re doing something right. And the Americans are making leaps and bounds. We were all following the overthrow of MACUSA in the papers.”

Lily didn’t answer. She just kept stroking her hair as Sonny continued to cry into Sirius’ shirt.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Maybe, if Sirius hadn’t been such so self-centred back then, he would have thought of a way to help her. But he hadn’t. None of them had. And so Sonny Breckenridge became Sonny Greengrass, and the second she left Hogwarts, she was locked away in Greengrass Manner to await her wedding – Sirius had never spoken to her again.

Sirius dove into his memories, trying to remember what had happened to her. He knew the elder Greengrasses had been neutral, but they’d died in one of the Diagon Alley attacks, hadn’t they? Had Sonny’s life improved since then? He hadn’t thought to look.

“Sirius! Oh, it’s good to see you! When I realised I couldn’t remember where the Black house was, I hoped that you might be there.”

“Wait, you don’t think I’m guilty?”

“Of course not. You’d never kill Peter, even if he was a total waste of space.”

Sirius snorted. That was certainly the truth.

“Sirius, I need to know, is Ginny there with you?”

Sirius froze, debating how to answer. But his lack of response seemed to be enough for Sonny, as her head vanished from the fireplace, and a moment later, the flames were roaring up, and she was falling into Sirius’ arms. In nothing but a nightgown. Covered in soot.

She pulled herself upright with a formal grace he didn’t remember her having, and gave him a once over.

“You’ve looked better,” she said flatly, before turning her head towards the staircase beyond. “Where’s Ginny? She has that crazy blasted elf wrapped around her finger, and she can barely speak! I go off to shower and make dinner, and what do I find when I come back. My patient! Missing!”

Andromeda hurried up the corridor, wand at her side, then stopped short as she recognised the Greengrass matriarch.

“Sonny?”

“Ah! Andi. I should have guessed you’d be here too. The ring, did she take it off?” Sonny asked, a desperate yet relieved cast to her face.

“Yes, but only for about two hours. Sonny, what is that thing?! It _cured_ Lupin’s lycanthropy…”

Sonny cursed, then started mounting the stairs two at a time, leaving Sirius and Andi staring, dumbfounded, as their once bookish and shy friend raced ahead of them. Fortunately, she stopped at the first landing, turning slowly back around with a thoughtful expression.

“It worked? It cured him?”

That snapped Sirius out of his stupor.

“It did. Was horrifying to listen too, but it worked.”

Sonny nodded. “Ginny said as much a day ago, in one of her more lucid moments.” She continued up the stairs, pushing doors open to check inside. Sirius and Andromeda chased after her, catching up as she barged into the correct room, and found Moony – healthier than Sirius could remember seeing him since high-school – sitting in a chair beside Ginny’s bed, staring at her in deep thought. He looked up as they entered, and what followed was yet another expression of astonishment met with inattentiveness. Instead, Sonny grabbed Ginny’s hand, scrutinising the ring for several moments, before placing a hand on her neck and feeling for a pulse.

Only once she was sure Ginny was recovering – and Sirius thought she was, judging by the decreased redness in her face – she turned back to the crowd and gave them an exhausted smile.

“Sorry. Hi everybody. Long-time no see.”

“Sonny, what’s going on? Start explaining. She just showed up here with her House-Elf.”

Sonny took a deep breath, and Moony vacated his chair so she could sit down.

By the end of her story, Sirius wanted to blow something, several somethings, off the face of the earth. He wanted to kick Dumbledore out of his house. He wanted to protect his godson.

But he could do none of that, so he resolved himself to, for now at least, trying to contact him via the Floo. To warn him about Umbridge, and ask what he could do to help.

Sonny turned back to Ginny and released a long sigh.

“I see the way Harry looks at my Daphne. It’s the same way James used to look at Lily. He loves her, even if he doesn’t know it. And my baby girl loves him too. I can’t do much. I can’t fight in Harry’s war, I don’t know how to change. But I can do what I can to make sure this girl, this child he was willing to risk everything for, survives. If she doesn’t… I don’t want to think about what that boy might become.”

Sirius didn’t want to think about it either. He looked down at Ginny’s sleeping face and swore a silent vow to himself then. He would protect this girl like she was his own daughter.

And then it struck him.

Maybe he _could_ do precisely that.

* * *

**_Gryffindor Tower…_ **

The entirety of Gryffindor House was waiting for them as Harry, Hermione and Ron stepped into the Common Room. The room was crowded beyond belief, people packed like fish in a barrel, all of them staring at him.

“What? Did someone stick a ‘kick me’ sign to my forehead?”

He reached up and traced the lightning bolt scar.

“Nope, just this stupid thing.”

He started walking towards the staircase to the dormitories, and the crowd parted for him, unsure of itself. Almost as if no one was brave enough to ask the question everyone wanted to know the answer to.

He’d climbed two stairs before Seamus finally spoke up.

“My mum didn’t want me to come back this year. Because of _you._ ”

“Is that right?”

Seamus shifted awkwardly.

“What about the rest of you, then? How many of your parents think I’m a supervillain?”

Demelza Robbins sniggered at that, and Dean Thomas elbowed her silent.

“Well?” Harry asked again.

“No one thinks you’re a… a supervillain, Harry,” Patricia Simpson - seventh-year prefect – said.

“If you’ve been reading the Daily Prophet you do.”

Everyone kept staring at him. Every time he tried to look someone in the eye, they would jerk away immediately.

“I’ve read the same prophet articles you all have,” Harry said, folding his arms and raising an eyebrow at them. “And I know at least half of you are muggleborn or half-blood, which means you know what comic-books are. So, one of you explain to the rest of our esteemed comrades who Batman is please.”

More silence.

“I’m WAITING!!!!”

As one collective unit, every person in the room flinched at once. Finally, Colin – barely visible because of his short stature – spoke up.

“Batman is a… he’s a superhero who dresses up as a giant bat and uses fear and technology to fight criminals.”

“Precisely,” Harry said, tone instantly its usual upbeat merry affair. Hermione and Ron had taken up positions at the foot of the staircase below him. Hermione’s hands were clasped behind her back, ringing nervously. Ron’s was blatantly on his wand. Their faith in him – even without knowing what he was going to do – gave him the strength to go on.

“Just like the adventure books wizards write about me. Dem, who does Batman fight in the stories?”

Demelza, who seemed to be enjoying this far more than anyone else, flushed red at being called on, but to her credit, she acted the most Gryffindor of the lot so far.

“Batman fights costumed wackos. Like the Joker, who’s crazy, or Two-Face, who had half his face burnt off and makes decisions based on a coin-flip.”

“And Penguin,” Eliza Collins from second-year added. Though, judging by how her eyes almost fell out of their sockets as everyone looked at her, that statement was supposed to be internal.

“He’s my favourite,” she muttered, “I like the wind-up Penguin bombs.”

“Correct on all three accounts. Batman’s supervillains, in keeping with the theme of Gotham City being a loony bin, are all certifiably crackpot insane. Now that we’ve established that, someone explain to me why I am apparently a real-world Batman villain? Because, if you read the Prophet, that’s pretty much all I am at this point.”

Dean Thomas nodded his head. It was slight, certainly an unconscious thing. But he wasn’t the only one. Several people in the crowd were thinking along the same lines. If only he’d been smart enough to do this last year.

“No takers? I’ll spell it out for you. According to the Prophet, I’m Dumbledore’s pet, a liar, a mentally unhinged attention-seeking brat who just happens to be decent with a wand and a pureblood purest abusing laws to force young girls to marry me. Sounds pretty supervillain like to me. Right, Dean? Holly?”

Holly Seddon, whom Harry knew was the de-facto leader of the third years in Gryffindor and a very muggle muggleborn, nodded firmly. Dean didn’t answer.

“Now, most of you have known me for quite a while, so Katie, would you say I’m a frequent liar?”

Katie shook her head.

“You get in trouble so much it isn’t funny,” she said, and several people laughed, “But you never lie.”

“Neville? You sleep in the same dorm I do. Have I ever come across as mentally unhinged?”

“Um, not particularly. No,” Neville said awkwardly, shrinking back as the attention of the room swung towards him.

“Fantastic. What’s next? That’s right. Daphne. Angelina, Alicia, Fred, George, Dean, Simon, Amalexia… All of you saw Daphne and me together last year. She was one of the only people – this tower included – who believed me when I told you all I didn’t put my name in the Goblet of Fire. She was the only one who helped me through the Dragon task, and the person I pulled from the lake. The person I would supposedly, and I’m quoting the fucking Egg itself here, “sorely miss.” Ama? Care to enlighten those not versed in Pureblood politics how arranged marriages work in the wizarding world?”

Amalexia Ogden was the only pureblood Gryffindor seventh year this term. She was a bit stuffy, so wasn’t incredibly well-liked, but everyone knew her family was one of the richest in Wizarding Britain – they owned the Firewhiskey brand.

Ama stepped forward with what Harry had come to realise was the default posture drilled into pureblood heiresses. Last year he’d started looking for it. Most of Slytherin had it, a lot of Ravenclaw did too. A couple of Hufflepuffs, though most, like Susan Bones, deliberately walked normally to hide it. Amalexia was the only Gryffindor who did so, which made it stand out. Big time.

“Pureblood families often marry off their daughters during their later Hogwarts years,” she said crisply. “It’s tradition.”

Half the women in the room, Hermione included, all started shouting in indignation, and Harry had to try very hard not to let his self-satisfied smirk show.

Once the shouting dyed down, Harry spoke again.

“Daphne was in a difficult situation. She’s my friend. I _like_ her. I helped her out of it. We made the decision together, and you can ask her yourself if you don’t believe me. But I swear on every single god ever invented, that I would never, _ever_ force something like that on anyone. Boy, girl and everyone in-between.”

Several people had the decency to looked ashamed after that.

“That leaves the theory that I’m Dumbledore’s pet. When was the last time Dumbledore did jack _shit_ for me?”

That was the kicker. Dumbledore _hadn’t_ done anything for him in a long while. He’d ranted and raged several times the previous year well within earshot of other people about how he’d asked Dumbledore to get him out of the Tournament, and the Headmaster had refused. Furthermore, his speech at the end of second year was kind of ingrained into the brains of everyone who saw it. He’d stood atop the house table in the middle of the Great Hall with Godric Gryffindor’s sword and basically screamed at Dumbledore, the staff, and the entire school the truth of what happened in the Chamber of Secrets and how Malfoy and his father were both total assholes. He had not minced his words towards the Headmaster then and hadn’t since.

“His phoenix likes you,” someone in the back said, though Harry couldn’t see who it was.

“And Hermione’s cat wants to kill everybody. Your point?”

That did send the entire tower into peals of laughter, Ron the loudest of all. Hermione turned around and scowled at him, so Harry winked at her through his own laughter.

“So, we’ve established I’m none of the things the Prophet is calling me,” Harry said, counting off on his fingers for dramatic effect. “Which leaves the question, why is the Prophet printing what it does? It’s a newspaper, they have standards, right?”

Seamus and a few others – the most vocal of his critics he guessed – nodded vehemently at this point.

“Point conceded. I wondered that too, and did some investigating. And if there’s one thing I’m really good at, it’s sticking my nose where it’s not welcome.”

More laughter. He was getting to them. Winning people over. The more engagement he achieved with the crowd, the better his chances for a lasting impact. He desperately hoped Daphne was having as much luck.

“I learned that the Daily Prophet is a publicly-traded company. Anyone know who the majority shareholders are?”

Fred and George flinched, so Harry pointed to them.

“You know.”

“The Ministry,” Fred said. “With the Malfoy family a close second.”

Harry threw up his hands, argument made.

The congregation remained silent for several minutes, digesting this information until Seamus finally spoke up.

“Malfoy owns the news?”

“Him and Fudge, yes. Both of whom hate my guts. Hmm, I wonder why they’re throwing me under the Knight Bus?” He tapped his chin, then gasped as if a sudden revelation had occurred to him.

“Oh, _I_ know. Because Malfoy works for Voldemort, and Fudge is in Malfoy’s pocket! I wonder who benefits from the Ministry denying You-Know-Who’s return and calling the only person who _saw_ him come back and kill Cedric Diggory insane?”

Harry turned to go, leaving the crowd to digest that information, and Hermione and Ron quickly followed him up the stairs. His head was beginning to ache, the runes on his skin fading away. He hadn’t needed them tonight at all. Just his voice.

* * *

**_The next morning…_ **

Harry stood outside the gargoyle entrance to Dumbledore’s office with Daphne, Hermione, Ron and Tracey. His head felt like it was literally about to split open, and his muscles and bones ached like he’d run a marathon. But it was worth it.

He honestly hadn’t known if Voldemort would try and get to him on the first night. He’d expected some sort of trick on Malfoy’s part at least. But it appeared as though, if there had been a plan, Malfoy had forgotten to implement it while being bitch-slapped by Daphne. Oh, how he wished he could have seen it.

Now he just had to get through this meeting.

He’d been summoned to the Headmaster’s office before he’d even sat down to his breakfast. Not that he’d been expecting anything less, but still.

“But everything went according to plan?”

“Yep. It was honestly invigorating. I can’t remember the last time anyone in Slytherin stood up to Malfoy. We’ve all gotten so used to his whining we all just kind of… go with it at this point. Seeing someone shut him up won’t be forgotten any time soon. How’d Gryffindor go?”

“About as well I expected,” Harry said. “Got people’s minds working at least. But Gryffs are more stubborn than the other houses. It takes longer for them to admit they’re wrong. Slytherins, for all their problems – no offence Daph – are much better at swinging their sails in different directions. I’m more worried about Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff at this point.”

Hermione pursed her lips.

“Harry, Ron and I talked last night after you basically collapsed. If it’s a revolution you’re planning, then we’re in. But I’d have a few conditions. With everything going on… something needs to be done, and you’re the only one even trying to change things. I just worry that you could get dragged down a dark road if this doesn’t work.”

Harry nodded. He’d be lying to himself if he said he hadn’t drummed up similar worries.

“Make a list Hermione. You to Ron. All the things you think need to change, and why. Then we’ll trade notes and come up with a comprehensive strategy. Including one to keep us on the right path.”

They both nodded, so Harry turned towards the gargoyle and grabbed Daphne’s hand, squeezing it for support.

“Gummy Bears.”

The gargoyle moved aside, and Harry steeled himself before slipping free of Daphne’s grasp and making his way up the spiral staircase to the Headmaster’s office.

The office hadn’t changed since Harry had been here before, though maybe there were a few more instruments, he couldn’t tell. Dumbledore sat in his plush armchair behind the desk, and as Harry approached, he offered a lemon drop. Harry declined.

“Harry, might I say your entrance to the school last night was certainly breathtaking, though I imagine that was the point.”

“Astute, Professor,” Harry said dryly.

Dumbledore eyed Harry over his spectacles.

“Fawkes was rather indignant at getting cursed Harry. Blue feathers? Really?”

Harry shrugged.

“Would you have preferred mustard? Like Big Bird?”

“I’m more partial to magenta myself. Now, Harry, I need you to answer me honestly…”

“That’s rich but okay…”

“Where have you been?”

Harry smirked. He’d wondered if the bird could tell Dumbledore exactly where he’d found Harry. Apparently not. He probably assumed, correctly, that Harry had been in Greengrass Manor, but Harry didn’t feel any desire to confirm that suspicion.

“Godric’s Hollow,” Harry said semi-honestly. “You neglected to tell me my parent’s house hadn’t been sold or destroyed. Just left there in ruins. Sheets needed changing, the fridge restocking, but the utilities were still on, and I could eat what I liked when I liked, so it was certainly an improvement.”

Did the old man know that Harry had uncovered his conspiracy with Gringotts? Griphook and Snaptooth had assured him they would maintain the illusion for as long as they were able, but Dumbledore hadn’t become who he was by being easily fooled.

“And is that where Miss Weasley is?”

So that was what he wanted.

“No. Ginny is long gone. She’s being cared for in St Peter’s Hospital in Salem – experts in magical trauma and blood-based curses.”

Dumbledore flinched.

Sonny had contacted the Salem Institute for assistance, only to discover that someone had already called St Peter’s and informed them of Ginny’s ‘terrorist’ designation, and so they’d refused her. Harry had assumed it had been Dumbledore, this was just confirmation. Which meant he’d known about Ginny’s illness and done nothing. He’d hoped she would die in Azkaban. The question then became _why_.

Dumbledore sat back in his chair, scrutinising Harry.

“I must say, Harry. I admire your dedication to the girl. Four times you tried to break in, going on and on until you succeeded. Tell me, has Bill Weasley realised it was you who stole his _stele_ yet? He got in quite a lot of trouble with the Goblins for it. I believe a roasting spit was involved.”

“I hope they offered him some bacon afterwards,” Harry said, thinking about his neglected breakfast.

“Harry…”

“I don’t care what happens to him,” Harry snapped. “I got into Azkaban with only a basic understanding of Runes – I don’t even take the class! A trained Cursebreaker and Wardbinder could have broken into that goddamned rock on a _whim_.”

“Enough!” Dumbledore exclaimed, voice taking on an echoing property Harry was sure he’d seen in a movie once. “I will not have you talking about human life so carelessly Mr Potter. Not in front of me. Not while you’re a student at my school.”

“Then expel me. I’m sure if I sent a letter to Fleur she’d talk to Madame Maxine. Be careful Headmaster. I can’t remember the last time you did anything for the sole purpose of helping me, and I’m not feeling particularly inclined to saving the Wizarding World at the moment, or haven’t you been reading the papers?”

“That’s Miss Greengrass talking Harry, not you.”

Harry froze for a split second, but that was all Dumbledore needed to lock eyes with him.

He recovered, shoving back his seat and storming towards the door, completely unaware of the Headmaster’s intrusion on his mind.

“Harry! You cannot go on as you are. Voldemort will seek to use it against you. Separate you from your friends, your allies. From me. Only together can we defeat him…”

“No. Only by _fighting_ him can Voldemort be defeated. Don’t forget that.”

Harry slammed the door behind him and stormed down the stairs. Leaving Dumbledore with a lot of new information to sort through and plans to curate. The most important of which, was how to remove Archimedes’ Ring from its bearer as soon as possible.


	5. Chapter 5

#  _Five_

_*** Harry Potter was not one for sitting on his ass when shit needed doing._

_He stood flat-footed on the island of Azkaban, invisibility cloak flaring in the frigid and bitter wind of the North Sea, a rats nest of black hair sticking out at every angle. He supposed he would look quite the sight to any casual onlooker._

_This was the fifth time he’d stared up at the enormous and utterly depressing building, watching the faint and whisp like forms of hundreds of Dementors fly around the crumbling black structure._

_With any luck, it would be the last…_

* * *

**_Now…_ **

The second Harry left the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, his wand was in his hand, and he’d sighted at the nearest suit of armour.

“Reducto!!!”

The suit was aware enough to turn towards the oncoming spell and give a metallic grating of its jaw before it was reduced to scrap.

Daphne was kind of impressed he kept his rage channelled to only blowing up one suit. Either way, the other armours kept looking at them as he stormed towards the Great Hall for dinner.

“It’s fucking ridiculous!!!”

He’d said that about three times now.

“Harry, you can’t do anything about it,” Daphne tried – also for the third time – carefully grabbing his hand as they approached the Entrance Hall. Ron and Hermione hadn’t moved fast enough to catch them before Harry had stormed out of Umbridge’s class. Daphne, by virtue of being his fiancé, got to sit with him in every Slytherin-Gryffindor Class now.

And she could already tell the change was going to be seriously good for her morale.

Harry was so eager to learn, and he genuinely lacked the ingrained male tendency to refuse help from anyone. He listened with rapt attention as she walked him through her homework – how she wrote sentences and formed paragraph structures, which he’d apparently never realised was necessary before. _Seriously, Granger. Come on._ They’d sat for hours just reading her runes books at Greengrass Manor, Daphne gently explaining things he didn’t understand.

But Daphne wasn’t the only one doing the teaching. Harry was a natural at it. He could see the smallest incorrections, but never lauded them over her. He thought outside the box, something she’d always struggled with, and was perfectly willing to help coerce her rigid brain to open up. And his skill with a wand… It wasn’t as if she hadn’t known about it. She’d spent most of the last year with him after all. But until he’d turned that skill on her father in the arena – in a rule-bound match – had she truly _understood._ Her father had competed on the duelling circuit before he’d settled down. He’d been good at it too, and that reputation had helped protect their family from excessive coercion during the war.

Harry had disarmed, bound, and gagged him in ten seconds.

Yes, sitting next to him in class was going to be a serious boon. They made excellent partners; working together, she genuinely believed they could accomplish anything. And that was all _without_ Harry being her ticket out of the British Pureblood Wizarding World.

But she could _not_ let Umbridge keep teaching them.

For starters, it ruined all their carefully laid plans. Second, and perhaps more personally meaningful, Harry was just so… so goddam _sexy_ when he was angry.

Daphne was still working on not blushing every time someone said the word ‘fiancé’ out loud. It had taken all of her carefully curated focus and poise to keep from soiling her panties as Harry had practically ripped Umbridge a new one.

“She’s going to get people killed! Everything people learned before is all going to go to waste through something as stupid as lack of practice. And the young kids aren’t even going to be taught a shield charm! A _shield_ charm, Daph!”

If he didn’t calm down soon, Daphne was going to need to sneak away to rub one out, or she might just jump him in the middle of the castle.

“There’s nothing we can do about it, Harry…”

He growled low in his throat, and Daphne repressed a mewl. _Get it together!!!_

“She’s a fucking _hag_! A demon in fucking pink clothing…”

“Harry! You have to stop! If she _hears,_ you’ll be in another detention. If she tells Fudge, he could have you expelled! It doesn’t matter if he wants to keep you breaking into Azkaban silent or not.”

They stopped outside the dining hall, and Harry finally let some of the tension bleed from his shoulders. Then he wrapped his arms around her waist and pressed a chaste kiss to her lips.

_Oh, sweet Mother Mary and Merlin, I am so screwed._

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, pressing his forehead to hers.

“It’s okay. I love your passion, but you have to direct it. Use it to fuel the plan. Umbridge can wait. “

They separated, and Harry counted under his breath in French, as Daphne had taught him, just as her mother had taught her.

They stepped into the hall and sat down together at the Gryffindor table.

Project Wizarding Revolution Part 2.

They sat in silence, the entire Great Hall watching as they helped themselves to some roast beef and mashed potatoes. Daphne was finally able to calm herself down, enough to take note of Susan at Hufflepuff shooting her a pleading look and Cho Chang’s eyes trace the curve of Harry’s biceps. She would have to fix that.

The Slytherin table wasn’t much of a surprise either. Most of them were casting calculating expressions towards her, many of them no doubt trying to determine what her agenda was. A Slytherin sitting at the Gryffindor table, engaged or not, simply wasn’t done. But Daphne was pleased to note that Malfoy and his groupies were slightly separate from the rest of the cohort. It wasn’t noticeable to the general student body, but it was a clear sign for the politically minded of Slytherin and Ravenclaw that something had shifted within the House of Snakes the previous night.

Daphne’s speech had _worked._

“So, Daphne, can I see the ring?”

Daphne blinked, turning around to see Demelza Robbins standing over her shoulder, hands in the pocket of her sweatshirt.

Instantly, Daphne dove into her brain for information on the mousey haired petite brunette.

Gryffindor, one year below her; muggleborn; Arithmancy and Care of Magical Creatures electives; potential Quidditch player.

“Sure.”

Daphne lifted her left hand and held her fingers out to the girl, letting the diamonds catch the candlelight overhead.

* * *

**_One month ago…_ **

As their day in London drew to a close, Harry had led Daphne into a _mall._

Malls, she quickly decided, were her new favourite place in the known universe. 

This particular one was called the House of Fraser, and despite her impassioned pleading to go into every shop she could see (handbags!!! She _needed_ a handbag. Why had no witch ever thought of inventing a purse before!?) Harry had one last destination in mind before the shops started closing and they had to return to the manor.

And when she saw it, she had to admit this boy knew how to plan shopping trips. It was a jewellery store, with row after row of glass containers holding pieces of crystal, diamond and every gemstone she could imagine.

“I figured since we’re getting married and all, I should probably get you a ring. But I don’t know how to buy jewellery, so… next best thing? Bring you here, and I’ll dump a pile of shiny solid gold coins at the cash register.”

A high-pitched very unladylike squeal slipped from her throat, and she was kissing him. Hungrily, forcefully, so hard their teeth clacked together, and she thought their lips might bruise until Harry pulled them apart, tapping his watch.

She devoured ring after ring, consulting with both the attendant and Harry – who was not as bad at this as he’d claimed – on what stones matched her skin tone, complimented her eyes, hair and preferred shades of makeup. Harry was partial to emerald, but while the colour went with _his_ eyes for sure, it did not work with her deep blues. They settled instead on a gold band with a single small sapphire, surrounded by three shimmering diamonds on either side. Harry presented his bag of gold as promised, the attendant almost had a heart attack, and they were gone.

Daphne kept staring at her hand, sighing wistfully as they returned to Diagon Alley and Dobby appeared to apparate them back to Greengrass Manor.

She’d always known she’d be married to a boy one day. But she’d never expected she might get to marry someone as caring, thoughtful and easy to love as Harry. Daphne Greengrass was going to marry _Harry Potter_ , and honestly, she couldn’t be more thrilled at the idea.

And _not_ just because he was fabulous at shopping.

That was just a very, _very_ lovely benefit.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Demelza’s query was all it took for the floodgate to open, and girls from all years and all houses were rushing to Daphne’s side to ooh and awe at the stones on her finger. Daphne was blushing the entire time, answering rapid-fire questions about how Harry had proposed: “Very dramatically; a life-or-death situation if ever I’ve known one.” If he was a good kisser: “Oh you don’t know the half of it…” However, she was also asked, more seriously, if what Harry had said the previous night in the Gryffindor Common Room was real. Daphne could see, now that she knew to look, the genuine fear in many of the older girls’ eyes. The idea of an arranged marriage terrified them as Daphne’s father feared being roped into the Death Eater cult. Something she’d always expected, known, and understood, was anathema to them.

And she understood, just a little better, why Purebloods and Muggleborns didn’t get along. Why they feared and hated each other, despite being essentially the same. It was the difference between worlds, and the rather basic fact that neither group tried to teach the other about themselves. Muggleborns were given no instructions on how to enter the Wizarding World. It was no wonder they grouped together. Likewise, Purebloods believed they had no need to understand the ever-growing portion of their society that they saw as inferior and didn’t try too. A cycle that continued, over and over and over and over. Gryffindor vs Slytherin wasn’t about courage vs ambition. A brave man could be driven, and a woman with firm goals was nothing if she didn’t have the _will_ to reach for them. It was about two sides of the same coin being told that they were worlds apart. But Hogwarts straddled all sides – it was the gold that made up the coin itself – and it was perfectly suited to forging something new.

_‘Hem, Hem.’_

Daphne resisted the urge to gag as the crowd parted to reveal Madame Umbridge, standing in her fluorescent pink robes, staring daggers at Daphne.

“That is not part of the Hogwarts uniform, and I will be confiscating it immediately!”

Daphne snorted, raising her eyebrow at the woman. Then wiggled her fingers again, letting the woman watch as another ring faded into existence on her index finger. This one had no gemstones. It was just silver metal, with a unicorn crest—the sigil of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Greengrass.

Daphne was not, technically, entitled to wear it yet. She had to wait until she turned seventeen. But it hadn’t been hard to convince her mother to let Daphne borrow her house ring. Broadcasting it signalled that Daphne had full authority to make decisions on the part of the House of Greengrass, and that, should someone offend her, they would offend her house. Which would entitle her to bring up the slight in front of the Wizengamot.

Considering her father was a rather famous lawyer, who protected several high profile Wizengamot clients, pissing him off was not a move many were willing to consider contemplating. Daphne had intended to keep the House ring a secret until it was really needed to pull off a vital favour or two before her father found out and recalled it.

But that plan could go fuck itself, because there was no way this hag was going to touch her engagement ring.

Umbridge’s face turned stark white – as if she had actually not known who she was threatening – and Daphne made a gesture with her hand along the lines of ‘begone, peasant’.

Oh, the sweet satisfaction of watching the toad-woman flee with her tail between her legs. That was a Pensieve memory to save for sure.

* * *

**_A few hours later…_ **

_‘You must wake! The saviour is in danger!’_

Ginny snapped awake in her bed at Grimmauld Place, blinking rapidly in the darkness. The lamps had been turned out, and she could see no light from beneath the door. But there was someone in the chair beside the bed. Tall, with long, scruffy black hair.

Black.

_‘You must move.’_

The ring on Ginny’s finger pulsed once with soft white Light, and the fog on her mind seemed to part like the wind. Her memories, her sense of… of _self_ was still gone. Unclear and obscured from her, or perhaps it was just gone, and the fuzzy feeling in her head was her brain trying to interpret empty pockets.

But, for the first time in forever, Ginny’s thoughts formed as they should.

It was as if she’d breached the surface of the ocean during a terrible storm. And it was _horrifying_.

Every horrible memory she had left tried to sink its claws into her bruised and battered mind at once, and she couldn’t help the scream of pure, raw terror and agony that ripped free of her.

Black sprung awake at her side, but Ginny couldn’t think about him. There was only the cold. The seeping, bitter retched ice that permeated every part of her body, clinging like a leech to her very soul.

Greyback’s yellow eyes in the shadows, Bellatrix’s cackling like church-bells marking the hour, the moans and screams of a Dementor’s latest meal, the tearing, ripping _pain_ of the creature’s grip as they held your shoulders and pulled memory after memory after memory after memory after memory…

She couldn’t remember her face.

Her own face. What she looked like. She had no image of it. Nothing to recall of her own appearance. It was just… _gone_.

Exorcised.

Ginny couldn’t even think of herself.

Desperate for the agony to stop, she started smashing her head into the wall, wailing into the night.

“STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP…”

“Ginny! Fixate on one thing! Don’t let them all come at once!”

She could focus on one thing.

On hands gripping her, throwing her into the cell. Of screaming in rage and fury and biting the Aurors and hands ripping her clothes and…

“You have to remember what you love. What you care about most in the world!” Sirius yelled. He was holding her head, stopping her from braining herself on the wall. Why? Why stop her? They were the same, he knew that pain and the ache and the cold and why didn’t he just kill himself why didn’t he let her kill herself…

“What you love, Ginny. Focus on that.”

Ginny didn’t love anything. She couldn’t. They’d taken that from her.

She’d loved her family. They were all gone. She couldn’t remember any of her brother’s names. Couldn’t remember how many of them she _had._ All that was left was the teasing, the bullying. Being shoved down the stairs, doused in water and goop and doing chores. She had hand-me-down boys’ clothes and books missing pages. Her family hadn’t loved her. Or if they had, those memories were lost to her.

She’d loved herself once. Been proud. Now she couldn’t remember her own face.

“Can’t. Don’t know.”

“You can. Think of Harry. You can remember him? He saved you.”

Harry.

_Her_ Harry.

She could remember _him_.

His eyes, emerald green and shining like stars on the darkest of shadowed nights. Standing powerful in her hell, lifting her, saving her, shielding her. He’d… he’d _come_ for her. Twice. In the Chamber, and in Hell.

He was her saviour. Without him, what was Ginny at all?

_‘Yes! The saviour. You must hurry, or It will start the cycle again.’_

A whisper of elegance and peace fluttered through Ginny’s mind, piercing the fogged edges and pushing against the weight of her pain and fear.

_‘Follow my Light.’_

It took her a long time. So long, in fact, that Ginny wasn’t sure how much time passed from her awakening to the point where she stopped crying. Nor did she remember the lamps turning on or the other people entering the room.

Shakily, following Sirius’s words and setting all her focus on her Harry, Ginny counted.

“Un, deux, trois…”

“Quatre, cinq,” Sonny finished, smiling tiredly as she knelt at Ginny’s bedside.

“Are you okay?”

No.

Ginny tried to nod, but couldn’t bring herself to do it. This woman, whom Ginny didn’t know – though at the moment that wasn’t saying much – had cared for her. Nursed her. Right now, she was the closest thing Ginny had to a mother.

Aching in every way imaginable, she collapsed into Sonny’s side, and the blonde woman rubbed a hand against Ginny’s shoulders.

“It’s okay sweetie. It’s okay.”

_‘It is not! You must MOVE!’_

“I have to… to Harry,” Ginny tried, sitting up and trying to move from the bed.

“No way! You have to stay in bed…” Another woman, almost a female doppelgänger of Sirius, exclaimed, waving her wand over Ginny’s frail form.

“Needs help. She says he needs help.”

Standing behind the others, Lupin jerked forward.

“She? The voice?”

Ginny nodded.

“It spoke to me before,” Lupin said, turning to the others. “The ring has awareness. It knew Ginny was in danger before and told me… If it thinks something is wrong with Harry now…”

Sirius shot to his feet.

“Hogwarts, we can use the Floo, come on…”

She… she could remember the elf. Dobby. He was funny. Dobby and his socks.

“Dobby,” she whispered. And then the elf was there, standing atop her with a gleeful expression in his enormous eyes, a chef’s outfit clinging to a body even smaller than her own.

“Mistress Ginny is awake! Mr Harry Potter sir will be pleased…”

“I need to go to him,” she pleaded to him, ignoring the continued arguments of the adults around her. Dobby, loyal, funny Dobby, didn’t hesitate. He placed his stubby fingers on Ginny’s shoulders and disapparated from the room, leaving all the adults behind to yell and talk to empty air.

Not a moment later, the fireplace downstairs flared to life, and Albus Dumbledore stepped into Grimmauld Place.

_‘Perhaps I can manoeuvre Sirius into asking Harry to bring him into Greengrass Manor. Ginevra and Cultivation’s Ring must be there, and I can track the magical signature to get past the War Wards…’_

* * *

**_Hogwarts…_ **

_Holy fuck. That’s just sick._

Umbridge’s Office on the Fifth Floor of Hogwarts was like the Pink Panther’s worst nightmare. The stone walls had been painted fluorescent pink, and hundreds of ceramic plates full of cat pictures hung on the walls. The room was circular, dominated by a large wooden desk covered by a white tea cloth. And sitting in the high-backed pink velvet chair behind the table was Madame Umbridge herself, in all her toad faced glory.

“Mr Potter. How good to see you,” Umbridge said sweetly, and Harry had to try very hard not to draw his wand and blast the woman into next week.

Harry reluctantly took a seat on the other side of Umbridge’s desk, trying incredibly hard not to gag.

“You’re going to be doing some lines for me tonight, Mr Potter. I want you to write, ‘I must not tell lies.’ Can you do that for me?”

“I think I can manage,” Harry said flatly, before reaching into his bookbag.

“No, not with your quill. You’re going to be using a rather special one of mine,” Umbridge placed a quill and paper in front of her, and she picked up the pen. The paper, like everything else in the room, had a pink tinge to it.

“How many times?” he asked.

“Hmm. Let’s say, enough times for the message, to sink in.” Harry, resisting the urge to sigh in frustration, put pen to parchment and began to write.

Line after line he scribbled, deliberately making his handwriting as illegible as possible, just to spite the woman. He let his pen motions become automatic, thinking instead about his potions essay. There was a dull aching in his hand that was mildly annoying, but he ignored it.

Almost an hour after he started, Umbridge moved from her seat to walk over to the mantle of the room’s fireplace. She took a kettle and poured some tea into two cups. She came back and took a sip from her cup before offering the second to Harry.

“Tea?”

Harry graciously took the offered cup, ignoring the continuing ache in his right hand. He took a sip from the tea, which wasn’t that bad really, muttered a thanks, and continued writing. Another few minutes, and a few more sips of tea, Harry put down the quill and finally gave in to the urge to scratch at his skin.

The words _‘I must not tell lies,’_ had actually _cut_ through the skin of his hand. Even as he watched, the letters sunk into his skin, leaving the flesh an ugly red.

Harry’s vision burnt to red.

His wand snapped into his hand, tip fixed on her forehead, sizzling with power. But he couldn’t get out of his seat. His pants were stuck to the wood, chair bolted to the floor.

“What the fuck did you do to me?”

“It’s pointless to resist, Mr Potter. You can’t leave. The second you sat down in that chair; a permanent sticking charm took effect. Now, you are going to put down that wand like a good boy, and tell me everything Dumbledore has you doing, and tell me how you ensorceled the daughter of Jacob Greengrass, a connected and influential Pureblood wizard.”

Umbridge sat back in her chair, a smug smile on her face.

“Stupefy.”

The hag crumpled into unconsciousness, completely shocked that Harry had actually cast a spell on her. The cats in her plates all started screeching, bolting out of the ceramics, probably to alert someone.

Shit.

In a panic, he tried to stand up, but true to Umbridge’s word he couldn’t lift the chair.

He tried severing charms on his pants, on the floor, neither worked.

Just as he was about to blow up the stone, _Dobby_ popped into the room.

And Ginny was with him.

He was so stunned he actually forgot where he was for a moment.

She looked… healthier, though not by much. Her hair was still dark and coppery, with no life or bounce to it, skin pale as fresh winter snow, entire body thin and stunted. But she did appear stronger than when he and Daphne had left her days before.

After all, she was standing under her own effort. Something she’d been entirely unable to do at Greengrass Manor.

“Ginny?!”

“Harry!” She stumbled to his side, pulling him into a desperate hug, but Harry didn’t have time to enjoy it.

“We have to get out of here, the teachers… Umbridge will wake up…”

Ginny parted from Harry, and her gaze fell on his hand.

“She hurt you.”

“Ginny… we need to go. Dobby can you get me out of this chair…”

“Yes, Mr Harry Potter sir!”

Dobby snapped his fingers, undoing whatever spell Umbridge had used, and Harry sprang to his feet, breathing a sigh of relief.

“You HURT HIM!”

Ginny _pounced_ on Umbridge’s stunned form and started beating her in a frenzy, and Harry leapt to her side.

“Ginny, stop!”

She didn’t listen, grabbing Umbridge’s head before he could stop her and _smashing_ it into the stone. Tiny wisps of white smoke flickered around her fingers.

The toad woman’s head splintered like an egg, blood and bone and brains splattering over the ground, and Harry yanked Ginny away from Umbridge’s body. Then, a thin trail of Light fled Umbridge’s body, and was _siphoned_ directly into the jewel on Ginny’s right hand, which was pulsing with white energy.

Harry pulled Ginny’s face into his chest as she started crying, still staring at Umbridge’s corpse.

He needed too… too… what could he…

Dobby snapped his fingers, and Umbridge’s remains vanished from the room.

“Do not worry, Mr Harry Potter sir and Mistress Ginny. Dobby will fix!”

Then he grabbed them both and disapparated as Filch came barging into the room.

**_*Ha! Bet you weren’t expecting that!!!_ **


	6. Chapter 6

# Six

Daphne practically vaulted through the Floo after her mother called through in a panic, saying there had been a family emergency. _Merlin, please let Harry be okay._

She hadn’t seen him since his detention with Umbridge started several hours before, and now neither Harry nor Umbridge was apparently anywhere to be found. Tracey had told Daphne about seeing Filch running through the hallways, screaming for the woman with no answer. Something about cat paintings and how they couldn’t talk? 

Daphne ground to a halt, and literally couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

Standing in her families living room was one Sirius Black, hands above his head staring flatly at Daphne’s father. Between the two of them, Professor Lupin, looking better than she’d ever seen him in the third year, was trying to get the two men to calm down. Holy mother of magic, he looked _ten years_ younger.

Ginny. She’d given him the ring. Gone to him after Harry and Daphne and Daphne’s mother had expressly told her not to until she was healthier.

_Oh god… Was Ginny dead? Was that why Black was here?_

“She just disapparated in front of us,” her mother was explained breathlessly as Daphne exited the fireplace, “and a good thing too, otherwise the Headmaster would have found her for sure. Sirius and Remus tried to go after her to Hogwarts, but Dumbledore was in the house, and they couldn’t leave, and I was trying to hide. Thank Merlin he had to return to the school, but that’s a new problem…”

_What?_

“Mum, talk slower. What new problem?”

“Umbridge. Or rather, her corpse. She’s dead. Sirius… ah, well he transfigured her body into a pig statue and incinerated it.”

Daphne’s legs started to tremble, and she grabbed the fireplace mantle for support. Which turned out to not be a great idea, as Astoria came through the Floo at the next moment, and both girls ended up flat on their faces, in the middle of the carpet.

Astoria pulled herself up, face red, and she poked her tongue out at Daphne.

“You did that on purpose! You knew I was behind you.” Then she turned to their mother.

“So, what happened? What’s the emergency?”

Daphne sat up hesitantly, blinking rapidly.

“She’s really dead?” That was about all her brain could manage.

Astoria gasped.

“No! Not Ginny! Please, not Ginny. She’s great! And Harry will be so sad. Shouldn’t he be here…”

That got Daphne’s mind functioning again. She shot to her feet, looking around frantically for any sign of Harry. He had to be here…

“Ginny’s… she’s with Harry,” Black said awkwardly. Daphne’s father still had his wand trained on the man’s head.

“Get out of my house Black! I won’t ask again!”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Jacob put your wand down!!!” Sonny snapped, and if she hadn’t already reached her shocked quota for the day, that certainly would have done it.

Daphne had never heard her mother raise her voice. Not once.

Jacob was so stunned he followed her instruction, lowering his wand in a sort of fugue state. Professor Lupin snatched the shaft of wood from his hand and placed it on a coffee table.

“Um, hi. I’m…” Sirius began, but Daphne had already moved past him. Introductions could be made later. Right now, she needed to see Harry. Needed to know what had happened. Had he killed Umbridge? What had she done to provoke him?

She stormed towards the staircase, leaving the adults to quarrel behind her.

She reached Harry’s room and finding the door unlocked, eased it open. Harry was cuddling Ginny, who had tucked herself into a ball and was slowly rocking back and forth. Tears were streaming down her face, silent sobs spilling from her mouth. She still _looked_ on death’s door, but Daphne got the distinct impression that she wasn’t any more. Her hair had lightened several shades, becoming a blood-red rather than the dull copper colour she’d possessed when they first rescued her, and a touch of warmth had returned to her cheeks and lips.

Harry caught Daphne’s gaze and smiled softly, beckoning her over to them. Daphne did so, sitting elegantly on the other side of Ginny and taking the girl’s hand. The white ring on the girl’s finger pulsed twice.

“What happened?”

“Umbridge had me trapped with a permanent sticking charm; she was going to… I don’t know what she was going to do, but at the very least, she had me use this quill that cut my skinduring the detention.”

He held up his right hand, showcasing scratched out lines, dry blood still crusted on his skin.

“That’s… that’s barbaric.”

“Ginny says the ring has a voice, that it told her I was in trouble,” Harry said awkwardly, using the wounded hand to stroke Ginny’s hair. She stilled slightly under his touch, ceasing her rocking motion, though she was still crying. Daphne started rubbing circles into Ginny’s hand as well, and, oddly enough, the poor girl calmed even further, letting out a soft breath of air. Her sobbing started to fade.

“She used Dobby to bring her to Hogwarts and…”

“I killed her,” Ginny whispered, voice flat and without remorse. “She… she hurt you… I…” She swallowed, gathering her strength.

“You saved me. You came for me when no one else did. Twice. I won’t let anyone take you from me again.”

Daphne took a deep breath. Umbridge dead? Well, it hadn’t been part of the plan. But, that being said, she hadn’t been _in_ the plan at all, and Daphne had started worrying about what influence she could have. Having the woman dead and unable to meddle was undoubtedly a boon. But what would Fudge do about it when Umbridge’s disappearance was noted?

Beyond the door, Daphne’s father’s yelling faded into the room.

“Taking care of the girl I could deal with, but now we’re talking about sheltering murderers, Sonny!!! And you let a convict and a werewolf through our War Wards!!!!”

Harry drew his wand and cast a silencing charm on the door.

“I’m a murderer,” Ginny muttered. “For real this time.”

“It doesn’t matter. _You_ saved _me_ this time, Ginny. That just proves you’re still you, no matter what the Dementors did. You’re still the girl who was strong enough to fight off Voldemort himself for an entire year, who stopped the Basilisk from killing. I’m just sorry it took me four tries to get you out of that fucking prison.”

Ginny locked eyes with Harry. Her tears had stopped falling.

“Four times?”

Harry nodded.

“I never gave up on you. I… I just wasn’t strong enough to get you out earlier. I tried… God, I tried.”

Then Ginny leaned in and placed her lips against Harry’s in a gesture so soft, so heartfelt, that Daphne practically swooned at how gorgeous it was. What was wrong with her?! She should be furious. Harry was _her_ fiancé!

Instead, all she could manage was to squeeze Ginny’s hand tighter.

“I’m sorry,” the redhead said, pulling away in embarrassment, trying to hide in her blood locks. Harry was repeatedly blinking, stunned.

“I shouldn’t… But everything is so dark. My thoughts are fleeting; memories blurred like fog. Sirius, he said that I have to focus on what I love. But they… I can’t remember what I loved. Or even if I did. I… I can’t remember my own face.”

The tears started falling again, and Daphne grabbed a cloth from the bedside to wipe them away from Ginny’s red-ringed eyes.

“All I have left is you. You saved me from the… from that thing, so even after everything else was gone, you were there, killing it, helping me out of the Chamber. And… _Four times.”_

But no matter how hard she tried, Daphne couldn’t bring herself to feel jealous, or anything like it. She had helped rescue Ginny too. Participated in her recovery. Watched her heal.

Harry was all Ginny had. Loving him was the only way to save her soul from literal and personal hell. However, Harry was also Daphne’s. She had spent far too much time and effort to give him up without a fight, jealous or not.

Well, if love was what this girl beside her needed, Daphne would just have to make sure Ginny was as attached to her as she was to Harry.

So, steeling herself, not thinking about the absurdity of what she was doing, she leaned in and kissed Ginny’s lips herself.

They were… softer than Harry’s. Which was odd. Daphne had expected them to be harder, or rougher maybe, because of her time in Azkaban. But no. They were like the caress of soft silk sheets, freshly washed.

“If its love you need,” Daphne said, voice so soft they all had to lean in to hear, “Then I think we can accommodate.”

And so, for the first time in her life, Daphne Greengrass set aside all her ambitions, her goals and her plans, and did something completely, and utterly selfless.

She helped another person find themselves again.

Together, Daphne and Harry pulled Ginny down to the pillows, and just let her weep, stroking her skin, her hair, whispering words of comfort. Until, eventually, they all fell into an uneasy sleep.

**_*There was originally going to be a lemon with Harry and Daphne here, but we decided it didn’t feel right given the scene’s tone. It will come up in later chapters, and Ginny will get involved once she’s a bit healthier too. Polyamory for the win!_ **

* * *

**_Meanwhile at Hogwarts…_ **

It would surprise absolutely no one to learn that Hermione had utterly missed everything going on around the school that night because she had built herself a proverbial fortress of books and tomes in the back corner of the library.

However, what would certainly surprise the ever-loving _crap_ out of most everyone was that _Ron Weasley_ had gone with her. Entirely willingly, and without the prompting of last-minute homework.

“Archimedes was a Greek Mathematician,” Hermione explained, flipping through her notes, “He was the first person to calculate the surface area and volume of a sphere, and he discovered the pi variable.”

“Hermione, I’m sure that’s really important, but I have no idea what any of it means. Can you _please_ talk like a normal person?” Ron said, looking up from the piece of parchment he was scrutinising – their list of ideas and plans for Harry and Daphne’s revolution. In the candlelight of their makeshift book fort, a second parchment could be seen beside him. An outline of Hogwarts, with what looked like chess-pieces, and a legend along the side.

“Sorry. Archimedes was a famous inventor back in Ancient Greece. He built dozens of machines that became integral to siege warfare during the Dark and Middle Ages, like the modern catapult, water pumps and compound pulleys. He was also a powerful Wizard, an arithmancer specifically, and one of the first Wardbinders. His weapons and defences helped Carthage hold out against the Roman Republic for years.”

“Okay, that I understood. And he made that ring?” He gestured to the sketch on Hermione’s desk that Harry had given them.

“Certainly. One of the Three Rings of Power. The Greek wizards were obsessed with recreating the ancient devices of the Elves, and many of them succeeded.”

Ron frowned. “So why haven’t I heard about them before if they’re so powerful and a bunch of them were made?”

“Easy,” Hermione said, “The creators of these early rings forgot what the ancient elves built theirs for in the first place: to protect and nurture their civilisations, to shield them from men. They were never designed for warfare, and couldn’t be used to fight an enemy, only shield from it. Anyone who tried to use one of the rings offensively caused them to quickly lose power and become useless.”

“Like pawns in chess. Not good at attacking, but good at blocking your opponent,” Ron figured.

“Precisely. But the Greek wizards didn’t want pawns, they wanted Queens that could rule the battlefield and provide superiority.”

Ron was already nodding before she finished her sentence.

“But queens flame out quickly: good for brute force or sneak attacks, but they’re a massive target.”

“The rings the Greeks built were designed to win wars,” Hermione continued, reading from her notes. “So, they burned out quickly. I’m sure they helped win certain battles or skirmishes, but their powers would have run out very quickly.”

“So why does the one the Goblins gave Harry still work?”

“Archimedes saw what the other Greeks didn’t, so when he created his rings, he imbued them with powers designed to protect and bless their wielders and those around them. Based on the sketch Harry gave me, Ginny’s device is the Ring of Cultivation. Invested with the power of growth and healing, it could supposedly heal any injury and restored a person to their ideal self. There are even documented instances of a person wearing the ring _changing gender_ , which is incredible.”

Ron frowned, putting down their list.

“If it’s so powerful, why can’t it heal Ginny properly?”

Hermione bit her lip, grabbing another tome from the stack.

“I’m not sure. The library doesn’t have much on maledictions, and what they do have is mostly in the restricted section. From what I’ve been able to piece together, maledictions infect a person’s soul. So, if Ginny sees her disease as a part of her ‘self’ as it were, the ring wouldn’t be able to heal it properly, if it even can.”

Ron swallowed, then stood up and leaned over Hermione’s shoulder.

“What about the other two? You said there were three.”

Hermione shifted her notes again, retrieving a dusty tome and flicking to a page with three sketches. The first he recognised from the one Harry had given them. The second had a square-shaped jewel at its peak, surrounded by two intricate radial square patterns embedded in the metal of the band. The third ring contained no large gem, but rather ten smaller ones of identical shape and size, circular, and bound together by swirling lines that gave Ron the impression of the wind.

“The Ring of Devotion and the Ring of Honour. Devotion was said to instil hope in people around the wearer and allow them to sense, dampen and enflame love, attraction, connection and affection between individuals. It also made them fiercely protective of the things they loved, both human and objective, and extremely persuasive.”

“Cool,” Ron said, before tapping the third ring. “Honour’s ring? What does that do? Make you into the perfect Gryffindor?”

Hermione laughed.

“No. Not by a long way. Honour, at least according to this, is about bonds. Of binding oaths and responsibilities to people, places and things. Gryffindor would be closer to Valour if I had to describe it in a single word. The ring of Honour was considered both the weakest and the most dangerous of the three. The wielder would be physically bound by _any_ promises made or oaths sworn while wearing it and could do the same to others. Literally binding their souls and magic to the words they spoke, _and_ any wizard within proximity of the ring’s wielder was apparently much stronger than they were away from it.”

Ron whistled, impressed. But he’d noticed one rather glaring problem in Hermione’s explanation.

“If these things are so powerful, how come Carthage still fell to the Romans?”

Hermione grit her teeth, then gestured to the book. The next pages had all been ripped out.

Not good.

* * *

**_The next morning, Hogwarts…_ **

Ironically, Daphne didn’t have to use a single one of the preprepared defences she’d drilled into Harry before they returned to the Castle that morning.

Everyone _knew_ that something had happened. Umbridge was still missing, his hand was in a cast, and by now the entire school knew that Harry had been in detention with the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher the previous night.

But either no one had the balls to accuse him of murdering another teacher (Harry caught several whispers of ‘its Quirrell all over again’) or the curse on Defence teachers was now so infamous everyone was just sort of going with it. Maybe, if Umbridge had tried, at all, to endear herself to the student populous, someone might have cared that she was missing. But she hadn’t, so no one did.

All things being equal though, Harry got the impression the reason no one came to ask him about the detention was because this morning – as per their original plan – Harry and Daphne had elected to sit at the head of the _Slytherin_ House Table for breakfast.

The entire rest of the house had packed the far end of the table so tightly you’d think Harry and Daphne had fallen in a vat of troll dung. It had to be one of the absolute best stunts he’d ever pulled, and that was saying something. Malfoy kept opening and closing his mouth like a dead fish. Fortunately, Colin had seen the expression too and was taking frequent snaps of the pasty-skinned platinum-haired dickwad.

Surrounded by empty space, they simply ate their meals peacefully and silently, save the odd comment about passing the bacon or salt. It needed to be silent, because Harry honestly didn’t think he’d hold back the laughter that wanted to burst from his form every time he glanced towards Snape. The greasy-haired, hook-nosed professor was sitting with a posture so straight you’d think his spine was rigid steel. But his eyes… they were practically bugging out of his head as he stared daggers at Harry.

When they’d first sat down, Snape had started to rise – clearly intending to reprimand him – but Dumbledore had moved like the proverbial snake and stopped him from leaving the staff table. So now he just sat there, as though desperately trying to keep his head from exploding.

Daphne nudged him under the table, and Harry glanced to Dumbledore, who was now having a hushed conversation with Professor McGonagall. The transfiguration teacher saw him watching them, and gave the smallest nod of approval.

Something bloomed in Harry’s chest at that, though he wasn’t entirely sure why.

Sadly, all good things must come to an end, and after Dumbledore announced that all Defence classes for the day were cancelled, Malfoy decided to ruin what, until that point, had been one of the most enjoyable meals of Harry’s entire life.

“Potter, what do you think you’re doing at my table.”

The Malfoy heir was standing directly behind Harry, surrounded by his usual associates. However, the thing to note was that no one else had made a move to rise from the Slytherin table. Even more telling, was that everyone from the other houses who _had_ been leaving, froze instantly. If Draco had been intending to use the other houses leaving as cover, he’d failed.

“Last I checked, this was the Slytherin table, not _your_ table. Unless there’s a plaque somewhere I missed.” Harry frowned.

“There isn’t a plaque is there?”

“No,” Daphne replied nonchalantly, spearing the last piece of her pork sausage and placing it elegantly in her mouth.

“Oh good. Was worried for a sec there but seems we’re all good.”

Malfoy clenched his teeth.

“What are you doing at the _Slytherin_ table? Go back to where you belong.”

“I _belong_ next to my fiancé,” Harry observed, placing his fork down and taking a sip of pumpkin juice. “I’m more than allowed to sit wherever she does.”

“We don’t want you here, and you can take your wh…” He bit his lip mid-sentence, but it was evident in the otherwise silent hall what he’d been going to say.

“Was there a poll done?” Harry asked, “I suppose we could do one if not.” He leaned over the table and waved to the bunched up Slytherins at the far end, who were all watching them.

“If you’d like me to leave, raise your hand. A simple majority will do it. If my presence makes people uncomfortable, I’m more than happy to move.” Then Harry slapped Malfoy on the back.

“Democracy in action. Isn’t it great? Let’s hear it for banning me from the Slytherin table. All in favour?”

As he’d expected, no one lifted their hand, all of them no doubt believing he’d been making a joke.

Harry gave an over-exaggerated sigh, reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out ten galleons, which he promptly handed to Daphne.

“You win,” he said, shaking his head.

“Told you so,” she answered smugly, accepting the coins.

“Win what?” Malfoy asked, confusion evident in the scrunched expression of his face.

“We were talking about why Hogwarts doesn’t teach civics or economics. I said it was because, if you needed to learn them, your parents surely taught it, so the school didn’t need classes. Daphne said it was because the Ministry doesn’t want people knowing how politics actually works, so banned both civics and economics in 1947 after Grindelwald’s uprising. I should have _known_ her explanation was too specific.”

Harry shook his head, then stood up from the table and offered Daphne his hand. She took it, raising herself, and the couple walked past Malfoy and towards the exit.

Once they were out of eyeshot, Harry pulled another five coins from his pocket and handed them over.

“You’re right. Making him look stupid in front of everyone _is_ more rewarding than just punching or bespelling him to the ceiling, no matter how satisfying they are.”

Daphne patted him on the shoulder, then ruffled his hair as they made their way towards their first class of the day.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll give you plenty of opportunities blast him into oblivion honey.”

“Whatever you say… _babe.”_

The subsequent ‘ _CRACK!’_ of Daphne’s hand smacking the back of his head was audible from the Great Hall to the Greenhouses.

* * *

**_London…_ **

Sirius stalked down Diagon Alley as Padfoot in the early morning half-light. He’d had a lot of time to think the previous night as Jacob Greengrass was screaming at him, Sonny and Remus. And he’d seen, first hand, how much Harry cared for Ginny Weasley as he carried her weeping form upstairs to the bedroom to lie her down.

Getting rid of Umbridge’s body was the least he could do.

What he intended to do now, that was so much bigger. But seeing them last night, knowing the lengths Ginny – weak and fragile as she was – would go to in protecting his godson, erased any doubt he had about his decision.

Curling up at the bottom of the marble steps, he waited for the Goblins to open the bank doors and post their sentries outside, before padding up and into the establishment. There were no Wizards or Witches here yet, and if past trends held true, none would show up for at least an hour yet.

He transformed back into his human form and stepped up to the nearest counter.

“Greetings Master Goblin, could you please notify Account Manager Crackjaw that Sirius Black has urgent business?”

The goblin teller gave Sirius a side-eye, snarling with bloody teeth.

“What is your business, Wizard?”

“I need to make changes to my personal will, and would like his assistance on a matter of inheritance… and adoption.”

Vengeance and anger had been all that kept Sirius sane when he escaped Azkaban. Without the knowledge of his innocence… he knew, in his bones, that he wouldn’t have survived those twelve years. And he’d started his imprisonment in his prime with the benefit of Padfoot to stave off the worst effects.

Even with all of that, it had only been after he’d confronted Pettigrew and reunited with Harry and Remus that he’d realised how seriously _unhealthy_ those thoughts had been. During Harry’s fourth year, he’d worked long and hard with Remus and Andi to get himself stabilised. If he was going to be any use to Harry, he couldn’t be single-minded or insane. Even now, Andi kept reminding him that his fixation on Harry wasn’t a great deal better, but he didn’t have much else _to_ fixate on. He was essentially a prisoner in his own home; a home he’d hated and run away from. Focussing on Harry kept him from descending into darker and more destructive thoughts.

Ginny didn’t have a _single_ one of the advantages he’d had. She’d been _eleven_ when she was thrown into that hell, weak from her ordeal in the Chamber and exposed by Riddle’s raping of her mind. A little girl… and she didn’t even have the security net of knowing she was innocent. The truth was she _had_ unleashed the Basilisk, though not intentionally. He couldn’t imagine how her mind had survived those horrible cells with the Dementors feeding constantly. But it had, at least, something of it had returned. And she’d saved his godson.

Sirius was perhaps the only person with even a vague understanding of what she was going through. He could keep an eye out for the signs – for the things he did to try and cope – healthy and unhealthy. He could already tell her devotion to Harry might hurt her in the long run.

Maybe that was the purpose Andi wanted him to find. Taking care of this girl who was so much like him in all the ways that mattered. What was it Lily had always said? Something about helping one person…

“Adoption? You got a bastard running around out there Black?”

Sirius shot the goblin a matching toothy grin.

“Something like that.”

A Weasley didn’t have much ground to fight against a Malfoy – not in this corrupt world.

A Black, however, could get things done.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Authors Notes: I'd say sorry for being late, but I'm not, as I've spent the last two weeks both continuously puking my guts out, and glued to CNN as fascists stormed the US Capitol, neither of which is very conducive to inspiration. (Full disclosure, there has also been a considerable amount of doomscrolling... What have we come to?) And my husband is stuck on like ten-hour shifts as he works to save Australia's collective google account from a bunch of dumb ass politicians, so he's no help. *sighs.
> 
> Now if you'll excuse me, I need to suck up some courage and pee on a stick. Toodles.

# Seven

“Harry!”

Harry spun around as he left Transfiguration and waited for Ron and Hermione to rush up the stairs towards him.

They caught him, and Hermione pulled a muggle notebook from her backpack, flipping the pages until she reached one with three pencil sketches, each image accompanied by a list of notes.

The rings.

Harry pulled his friend into a quick hug, then separated and took the book from her as she blushed, clearly proud of herself. He scanned the page, reading Hermione’s notes as they walked.

“Cultivation, Honour and Devotion,” Harry muttered.

“We couldn’t find anything on where they might be now,” Hermione said as they started walking back towards Gryffindor Tower. “If you want to know more about these things, my only suggestion is to go to Sicily and hope there’s more information in Archimedes Tomb. But even if you could get there, there’s no reason to believe the wizards and goblins of the past haven’t already ransacked the place.”

Harry bit his lip. Another problem. He certainly couldn’t go to Sicily…

_Sirius_ on the other hand.

“Alright. Thanks, Hermione, this means a lot.”

“Harry… I can tell this is important to you; just please remember that these things are dangerous.”

Harry shot her a soft smile.

“I promise.”

They fell into silence as they slipped through the Fat Lady’s portrait and made their way up to the Fifth Years dorm, and when Hermione followed, Harry knew there was more to this conversation.

They stepped inside, Hermione locked the door, and Ron drew a scroll of parchment from his bag, shifting his weight from foot to foot, not meeting Harry’s eyes.

“We uh… we made the list you asked for,” he said finally, before handing it to Harry. He took the parchment, unrolling it.

As he’d expected, most of the piece was taken up by Hermione’s ruminations. Demands for things like House Elf Liberation, anti-slavery campaigns, better conditions and laws surrounding magical creatures and the other ‘beast’ races. Overall she wanted, more than anything else, a guarantee that this ‘revolution’ he was planning would be for _all_ magical people, not just Witches and Wizards.

Ron had requested just one thing, at the top of the page.

_‘I’d like to see my sister.’_

* * *

**_Last year, shortly after the Yule Ball…_ **

“AHHHHHHH!!!!!!!” Harry screamed as he was spat violently back out of the Gryffindor Floo. He crashed into the couch facing the fireplace – covered in soot and grime and frost – which promptly toppled over under his weight and dumped him to the stone floor.

“Ow.”

_‘Ow’_ didn’t really cover the pain he was in right now, but it was about all he could wheeze out. _This must be what being run over feels like._ He was struggling to breathe, arms and legs protesting even the thought of moving, and his head was ringing something fierce.

“Harry?! What the bloody hell happened?!”

Despite the bruises all over his body, Harry tensed. Ron.

He and Ron still weren’t on speaking terms; hadn’t so much as looked at each other since the First Task. Ron resented him for getting the spot in the Tournament, no matter how many times he shouted to the whole god damned world that he hadn’t entered and had subsequently tried to get out of it. Skeeter’s articles and Harry’s popularity following his duel with the Hungarian Horntail had only made things worse. On the flip side, Harry was just as furious at Ron, though for a radically different reason.

_“You fucking cheated, didn’t you? That Slytherin whore you’ve been buttering up, she must have helped, manipulated you. She told you it was a dragon, didn’t she? Bought you fancy robes so you wouldn’t get burnt to a crisp! Let me guess, she’s giving you some head on the side too huh?”_

_“Hagrid told me it was a dragon you dumbass! And don’t call Daphne a whore! Don’t call_ anyone _a whore. EVER. Daphne has been a better friend in the past few months than you’ve been all year. If I hear you say a single bad word about her again, I swear I’ll pound your head into a wall Ronald Weasley. Then I’ll write to your Mum and tell you exactly why I did.”_

Ron raced down the stairs and rolled Harry onto his back, eliciting another hiss of pain.

“Oh bloody hell,” he muttered, drawing his wand. Harry, unable to emit more than a croak, widened his eyes in horror.

“Don’t worry,” Ron said, though given how much his voice was shaking right now, worrying was definitely something Harry should be doing.

“I asked my Dad to give me a crash course on magical healing this summer; was gonna tell you but, well. Figured, after Sirius almost ripped my leg off last year, one of us knowing some quick healing spells was a good idea. Told Dad it was so I could fix myself when Fred and George pranked me, but I think he saw through it…”

Ron was rambling, but he eventually cut himself off, realising as such, and pointed his wand at Harry’s chest.

_This_ was how he died? Not at the hands of Tom Riddle, but from Ron’s notoriously crap spell-casting ability?

He muttered something Harry couldn’t hear… and the constriction in Harry’s chest vanished.

He sucked in a harrowing breath, pulling precious oxygen into his lungs as he rolled over onto hands and knees, pain ebbing away enough that he could move without wanting to reducto his brains out.

“Bloody hell…” Ron slumped against the overturned couch, relief evident in his face as Harry kept sucking in air. Eventually, he ended up sitting next to Ron, still wheezing and coughing.

“Nice… nice job,” Harry said, swallowing to try and pull some spit into his sore throat. He could really use a glass of water.

“Cheers mate.”

Ron put his wand down, hand still shaking, and took a deep breath.

“You went after Ginny again, didn’t you?”

Harry nodded.

This time, the third time, he’d tried flooing to the island, hoping there might be a visitor’s entrance he could use to get past the external walls. In the middle of the night, surely the guards would be asleep, right?

Well, he’d been right. There was a useable Floo in the guard shelter, and everyone had been asleep. He’d even made it inside the prison itself, onto the ground floor, before the Dementors had sensed him _through_ his father’s cloak and attacked. He’d been forced to Patronus them away, but that had set off the alarms, waking _everyone_.

His mad dash back to the Floo had resulted in his current condition.

“Yep.”

“You’re never gonna stop, are you?”

“Never.”

If it took him ten years to get to her, Harry knew he’d never stop trying. Even if it was her corpse he had to drag out. He would bring her back to the Burrow, and the Weasley’s could bury her properly. Abandonment or not, they were still her family, and Ginny would want to be buried at home. In the orchard she loved.

“Why?” Ron asked, eyes fixed on his feet. “Bill and Dad won’t talk about her, Charlie hasn’t come home since it happened, Mum starts balling every time someone even _mentions_ Ginny’s name. Fred and George and I… we had to pack up her room because Mum couldn’t bring herself to do it. And Percy… he blames the whole thing on Ginny. Won’t shut up about it. I think his words are getting to Mum as well. She’s searching for any explanation, any way past the pain.”

Harry fixed Ron with a stare.

“Everyone else has abandoned her. That’s why I’m doing it. Dumbledore never cared, her family and friends treat her as already dead, and you can’t mention Ginny in Hogwarts without a dozen different opinions popping up. But no one seems to care that she’s just a little girl; no one cares about _her_ in this. Just the actions she took or didn’t take, or questions of _morality._ No one cares about her. Except me. If I stop, all that will remain of her is a memory, when in truth she’s still out there.”

Feeling a bit better, Harry heaved himself up, pausing to steady himself for a moment, before starting towards the steps.

“Harry?”

He stopped, looking back to Ron’s pyjama-clad form.

“I’m sorry… for what I said about Greengrass. It was wrong, offensive and disgusting… I don’t want to be the type of person who says things like that. I’m no Malfoy. I… I just get so angry sometimes.”

The last tension left Harry’s body, and he offered his former friend a soft smile.

“In the immortal words of a man far wiser than either of us, ‘Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.’ Careful the demons you feed your fears to, Ron. They’ll kill you from the inside if they can.”

And with that, Harry left Ron in the Common Room.

He didn’t see the redhead’s silent tears.

* * *

**_Now…_ **

Harry looked up from the parchment. This time, Ron met his eyes, and Harry found a determination like carefully crafted steel.

“She’s my sister, I need to do what I can to help her. I won’t accept no for an answer.”

Harry nodded, then clapped his friend on the back.

“Come on then. Family reunion time.”

* * *

**_Greengrass Manor…_ **

On the night of the Full Moon, Daphne sat across from a Remus Lupin, a man who was looking far less wolfy than he should be. Also, she was genuinely concerned he’d snorted something because he was acting high as a kite.

“It’s just… just _incredible_ , you know?”

“I’m sure, Professor. Now, if you could just tell me what the Headmaster has the Order of the Phoenix guarding…”

Lupin was sitting in the armchair by the fireplace, the one her father liked to use, staring wistfully into the flames. He looked good, far better than when Daphne had last seen him. 

That ring truly was incredible. To cure lycanthropy? That was supposed to be impossible. But here Lupin was.

“I’ve been plagued by this fear and horror my entire life. Knowing I’ll never have to face it ever again… it’s just…”

“Incredible,” Daphne finished flatly. She sighed, turning to the two Black cousins, who were standing awkwardly behind her.

“What the hell did you give this guy?”

Andromeda smacked Sirius across the back of the head without a single change to her sour expression.

“Cloudmist,” the witch said, shooting an angry look at Sirius.

“What!? He was going out of his skin and annoying the shit out of me! Pacing the entire length of Grimmauld Place terrified that he’d still transform that night. I just slipped a tiny dose into his tea. It’s not _that_ bad.”

Lupin swivelled sluggishly towards Sirius and wagged a finger at him.

“Grimmauld Place… ha! A Grim old place indeed! You should take down the elf heads. They stare at you!”

Daphne facepalmed, and Andromeda smacked Sirius across the head again.

Thankfully, she was spared any more awkwardness by the flaring of the Floo. She stood up, leaving Lupin to his rambling, and started trekking across the silent and mostly empty ballroom.

_When I have my own place, I’m going to make sure it doesn’t feel this empty._

She’d had that thought more times than she could count.

Harry stepped out of the Floo, followed by Granger… and Weasley.

Daphne stopped short.

“Harry? Love? You didn’t say we’d be having guests?”

Harry smirked, stepping up to her and placing a chaste kiss against her lips. Daphne’s knees trembled, blood rushing to her face.

He pulled away, lips now slightly reddened from her lipstick.

“Sorry. Should have warned you in advance. But they’re on the inside now, and they have information you need to look at. But first…”

Harry glanced towards the staircase and the hallway beyond. To Ginny.

Ginny…

That thought made Daphne’s insides squirm a little too.

Kissing a girl? What had she been thinking? Well, she knew what she’d been thinking, but that was beside the point. _What had she been thinking?!_ It was supposed to be an unclean, foul, unnatural thing. That was how it had been described if the topic was ever brought up, rare indeed in the Greengrass household. But Daphne had felt none of those things. No, it hadn’t been like kissing Harry, but she’d be even more weirded out if it had been. Kissing Ginny – frail, desperate, tiny Ginny – Daphne couldn’t get it out of her head since she’d spent the night lying side by side with her. She… she… What did Daphne want to do about it? Well, the answer to that was simple. She wanted to try it again.

“Ron wants to see her.”

Daphne looked to the redhead. Gone was the uncertain, perpetually angry boy she’d spent the previous year watching like a hawk. If Ron Weasley had been a Slytherin, she’d have expected all manner of manipulations seeking revenge and Harry’s humiliation. But he was a Gryffindor, so instead she looked for pranks and ensured he was never lurking in a corridor for a hamfisted attempt at an ambush.

Now? Now Ron’s expression was one of steely determination. Head held high, jaw clenched, the eye’s following Harry’s upstairs.

She nodded her head.

“She’s in the kitchen with Mum, trying to get some food down. Sirius says he needs to talk to both of you, but Mum and Doctor Tonks said she needed to eat first.”

“Hey, kid! Good to see you not moping around,” Sirius called awkwardly from behind her, and Harry nodded, peeling away to go and embrace his Godfather.

“Oh, don’t worry, I did plenty of moping before I decided to radically overthrow the government. But, much like the Batman, I am nothing if not industrious. And hopefully wrapped in plot-armour.”

The two men hugged, then pulled away.

“What’s a Batman?”

Daphne groaned. Oh, god, no. Not again. He couldn’t have commented on the violent overthrow, but no, he just _had_ to…

“You don’t know who Batman is?” Harry asked, stepping back aghast.

“Come on,” Daphne muttered, shaking her head as she guided Hermione and Ron towards the kitchens. “He’ll be going on about that for a while.”

Sure enough, as they departed through a side-door, Hermione scrutinising every inch of the house with wide-eyes, Harry’s voice trailed after them.

“Dick was the first Robin, but he became Nightwing and was replaced by Jason Todd who was murdered by the Joker and replaced by…”

Daphne tuned him out as they ducked into the kitchen. The Greengrass House Elves – Tippy and Bobby – were busy cooking up a seafood dinner. Daphne thought she could smell lobster. She loved lobster.

Dobby, forever contrasted against the neat and ironed robes Tippy and Bobby wore, was dressed in florescent orange… Well, she wasn’t sure what it was to be honest, as she couldn’t look at him straight on for more than a moment without inducing a headache. Either way, he was waiting on Ginny, giving her a little plate of the chicken and lettuce sandwiches she liked. She was sitting at a chair at the small circular table in the kitchen’s centre, designed for just the family. Daphne’s mother hovered over her, ensuring she actually ate. Her father was nowhere to be found. But that wasn’t surprising. He was still fuming about the previous night; he would not appreciate two more unwanted guests. To be honest, neither did Daphne. The more people they let through the War-Wards, the more vulnerable they became. She’d need to look for an alternate location, preferably one inside Hogwarts. 

Ron stiffened as his eyes landed on Ginny’s fragile and petite form. Hermione started to move past him, but Daphne held out a hand to stop her. She had a feeling the two siblings needed to do this themselves.

Ron swallowed.

“Gin Gin?”

Ginny started shivering, little sandwich falling from her fingers for Dobby to catch. She turned towards him slowly, eyes running over him, face contorting into a pained expression. Concentration?

“I… I’m… I can’t…”

Ginny gripped the marble table in a vice, and Sonny kept rubbing circles into her back, whispering too softly for Daphne to hear.

Ron swallowed again, then took a step forward.

“Ginny? It’s me. Ron? Your brother?”

Ginny kept her gaze on Ron, like a deer caught in headlights, unsure what to do.

“Do you… uh… do you remember…”

“You used to throw dirt at me,” Ginny said. “In the garden. You through dirt at me so I’d get in trouble with… with… I… I can’t...”

“With Mum.” Ron finished, taking another step forward. “I used to get mad because Mum made me do the garden and not you. So, I threw dirt at you to get your clothes dirty, and Mum would throw a hissy fit.”

He took another step forward.

“Then, when Mum sent you to wash the clothes, we wore run off to the creek and jump into the waters together. When Mum or Dad found us, we’d tell them we ‘cleaned’ the clothes, so they couldn’t get angry.”

Another step.

Ginny blinked at him, her face loosening slightly as Sonny shot Daphne an imploring look. Daphne shook her head. No. She did not know what he was doing.

“I… I don’t have that. All I have is the rage and my fear.”

Ron smiled.

“Ginny Weasley was fearless.”

Ginny sagged, deflating and turning back to the table.

“That’s not me anymore.”

“Maybe not,” Ron agreed, finally reaching Ginny’s side and placing a gentle hand on his sister’s shoulder. “But we won’t know until we go looking for her.”

“I don’t know-how,” Ginny sobbed.

“Then we’ll do it together.

Daphne blinked. Then she blinked again. Slowly but surely, the two started talking, Ron narrating stories from their childhood as Ginny asked for the names of the brothers she couldn’t remember. He told jokes about the Twins and grandiose tales of Bill the Treasure Hunter and Charlie the Dragon Tamer. He avoided their mother, father and Percy, never raising his voice, and always explaining when she didn’t understand. Ginny didn’t laugh, didn’t really engage or ask questions, but she was clearly listening with unbreakable attention.

Eventually, maybe half an hour later, Sonny stood up and moved to Daphne and Hermione’s side, expression a mirror of Daphne’s own.

“How?” Sonny whispered, unwilling to disturb the two.

Hermione reached into her book bag and withdrew a thin tome with a leather cover.

“Ron found this in the Library at Hogwarts. It’s a guide on helping people who’ve suffered extensive Dementor Exposure.”

“Ron found it?” Daphne asked.

Hermione nodded, looking a bit dumbfounded herself.

“I… I didn’t know, but apparently, he’s been teaching himself first-aid, and learning the basic healing spells. He went straight to the Library after Harry told us about Ginny; knew exactly where to look. Better than _I_ did, and I thought I knew everything about the Library.”

Daphne looked down at the book in her hand.

_‘The Mental Mending of Magical Maladies, by Marigold Marybeth.’_

Glancing back to the siblings, Daphne’s jaw fell open.

Ginny was _smiling_.

Harry, Andromeda and Sirius arrived a little while later, and Daphne could instantly tell that Harry’s jovial mood had vanished. Replaced with that hard core he exposed after making a profound decision. The powerful, almost regal, persona he exerted that, even at sixteen, made everyone in a room focus entirely on him, and him alone.

That being said, the second he saw Ginny smiling, his face broke into such an expression of relief and kindness that Daphne almost melted.

“Is now a good time?” He whispered.

Daphne nodded.

“If it’s something serious, I don’t think there’s a better one. She’s more responsive than I’ve ever seen her.”

Harry stood there, watching the Weasleys for a brief moment, before sighing and walking forward. Daphne looped her arm in his and followed him to the marble table. Sirius, Hermione, Sonny and Andromeda all took seats too, and Ginny scanned each face. Daphne assumed Lupin had fallen asleep or was still rambling to himself as he came down from Sirius’ induced psychosis. Poor bloke.

Would be funny to watch Lupin get back at Black in the morning though.

“How are you feeling?” Harry asked Ginny, holding his hand across the table to her. Ginny took it gratefully, eyes lighting up at the attention.

“Better. A bit. I think.”

“Good. Because Sirius has a proposition for you.”

Ginny frowned, turning towards the tall, shaggy-haired man.

“Ginny,” he said, clearly nervous given the odd stutter that entered his tone, “I probably have a better idea of what you’re going through than anyone. I promise… it does get better with time. It takes a lot of work, though. And living on the run, constantly in hiding, looking over your shoulder? That’s no way to live. And certainly no way to heal.”

Daphne frowned, unsure where he was going.

“Sonny showed me a Pensieve memory of your trial, and, well, I had a bit of an idea.”

He reached into his coat, then pulled out a potion vial, placing it on the table. It was full of a thick red liquid that could only be blood.

_Holy crap!_

Instinctively, Daphne reached her own hand out to where Harry and Ginny’s were held across the table, clasping them both.

“You have one thing going for you. You _got_ a trial. Which means, if you have enough money, you can appeal with new evidence. Obviously, the Weasley’s could never afford that, and I doubt Dumbledore would let them either. The Black family, however, does have the money. I can’t use it to demand my own trial, not while I have an instant kill order on my head, but if you had the Black name and fortune, people would _have_ to listen to what you had to say.”

Sirius offered the petite girl a toothy grin. Daphne’s mind was whirling, all the possibilities flashing across her mind at once.

“We could throw the Malfoys and Voldemort onto the back foot, even distract Dumbledore from what Harry and Daphne are doing inside the school.”

He leaned forward, elbows on the table, and became… more intense, humour fading away.

“The Black family has a poor legacy, but it’s a powerful one nonetheless—an influential one. If I can, I’d see that legacy become a force for good, the antithesis of everything my mother and father preached. There’s also the issue of the family magics: the house, the spells, the Library, even Kreacher. I’m the last male Black, and with Andi disowned and Narcissa married to Malfoy, I have to assume Bellatrix is next in line. At the moment, the Goblins have Harry set as the holder of my Will; but he isn’t a blood relation to me, and nor is he pureblood. They think my Will is probably enough, but there’s no guarantee. Who knows what messed up enchantments my ancestors might have put on the house and the things in it, given their pureblood paranoia.”

He cautiously slid the glass towards Ginny. Hermione gasped, finally realising just what Sirius was suggesting, while Ron and Ginny still looked confused. Harry’s expression was unreadable.

“You, on the other hand, are pureblood, and if you drink that… You’ll have more than enough Black blood for the magic to catch. Technically you’d count as my adopted daughter.”

Ginny froze. Ron’s eyes flared wide, and he opened his mouth to speak, but Sirius quickly spoke over him, raising his hands in defence.

“It’s only a technicality. You’d still be a Weasley in name and blood and everything that matters. You’d just be Ginevra Weasley-Black. The goblins warned that you might undergo a _slight_ physical transformation, but that’s it. You’ll get instant access to the Black family magic – which has a lot in the way of curses and counter curses – and most importantly, you’ll cut Bellatrix permanently out of the inheritance.”

Ron calmed, and Daphne silently commended him. He really had grown up.

“I’ll understand if you don’t want to do it,” Sirius said meekly. “I’m not sure I would want to. I just can’t do much to help you, or Harry, or anyone else. I’m stuck, daggers pointing at me from all sides. But this? This is something I _can_ do. We’re not so different, you and me. And I think we can learn a lot together.”

The table fell silent, Ginny remaining perfectly still, save for the increased tightening of her grip on Harry and Daphne’s hands. She continued staring at Sirius, maybe trying to read his mind, see his intentions. Daphne could tell the man was genuine; there was no lie or deception in his eyes. He wanted to help, any way he could. He saw a kindred soul in Ginny and was reaching out, blindly in the dark.

After several tense minutes, Ginny’s head swivelled to Harry. She didn’t speak a word, but then again, she didn’t really have to.

“It’s all up to you,” he said. “I’d give you the world if I could, but I’d never force you to do anything you don’t want to.”

Ginny’s eyes sparkled once again at the praise. Turning, she looked to Andromeda, who’d been mostly silent.

“I think you’d make a fine addition to the family,” she said, smirking, “certainly better than the wackjobs we have now. I just worry how getting infused with the Black Family Magic might affect your condition.”

Sirius shifted slightly. It was barely noticeable, but Daphne caught it. That was the first time he’d lied all night. There was a secret there—something he wasn’t saying.

Ron spoke up then, and though the statement clearly pained him, Daphne’s respect skyrocketed.

“I think you should do it. We… we weren’t there for you when you needed us the most. And this can help you. A lot. So I think you should do it.”

Ginny turned towards her brother, a tear slipping free of her eye. Then she was wrapping her arms around him, squeezing him, hugging him tightly.

“Thank you,” she muttered.

“I’m sorry,” Ron replied.

They parted, and Ginny turned her attention back to the vial.

Then, with steady fingers and a determined gaze, she downed the potion in a single gulp.

A hundred kilometres away, in Hogwarts Castle, Professor Dumbledore looked up from Minister Fudge’s latest letter demanding to know where Madame Umbridge was. He glanced towards Fawkes, who had started singing a morose melody into the night, then to a book on his shelf. A book that had started glowing red in the dim light. He stood up, curious, and opened the cover.

_‘Error. Unauthorised removal of text from Library. Student: Hermione Granger. Current location of text: Greengrass Manor.’_

In the light of the Full Moon, Albus grinned.


	8. Chapter 8

# Eight

_***Harry Potter was not one for sitting on his ass when shit needed doing._

_This was the sixth time he’d tried to break into Azkaban Prison, which loomed above him now. Cold, forbidding and depressing. He would not fail again… again… again…. a….. aaaaaaaaaaaa…._

**!ERROR(3,13)!**

**stack trace compiling…**

**!LogicERROR! Unstable Universe Detected.**

**stack trace compiling…**

**!ERROR(7,3,24)(3,13)!**

**!Invalid script resource request! Commence termination…**

**!ERROR(0,1,0)!**

**Unable to terminate root universe… Commence cache flush emergency patch and reset…**

**…**

**…**

**Reset complete.**

**Patch complete.**

**Variable bypassed.**

**Resume program…**

* * *

“ALBUS!!!!!”

Dumbledore jolted backwards as the shrill voice of Molly Weasley tore through his office like a stampede of wildebeest. Fawkes shrieked in outrage, falling from his perch then bursting into flame and vanishing. He dropped the book with the location for Miss Granger’s stolen text, and it hit the ground, cover snapping closed.

Molly burst through the fireplace in a nightgown, face flush red, clutching… a _clock?_ Why in Morgana’s Godforsaken name was she interrupting him in the middle of the night for a clock!?

“Oh god, Albus! Please, tell me it’s not true!” She came running up the stairs to the upper floor of the office, hysterical, face brimming with tears, and thrust the clock at him.

“Calm down Molly, I’m sure everything will be…” He trailed off, looking at the clock for the first time.

Of course. Molly’s clock. The clock that tracked the children.

Everything seemed to be in order. Or, mostly. Ronald’s misshapen spoon was currently set to ‘Away’. Presumably, he was in Greengrass Manor with Granger and Harry. The Twins were both still at the school, Percival was pointing to ‘Lost’, and the elder brothers were set to ‘Abroad.’

“Molly, I don’t understand. What’s the problem?”

“It’s Ginny!” She wailed, holding up another spoon, snapped in half.

Oh. Right. The girl.

The girl Harry was fixated on.

Albus had hoped the malediction Fawkes inflicted on her would kill her quickly and rid him of that particular issue. But now she was becoming a bigger problem by the hour. It was thanks to her, and Ronald’s insecurity, that Harry had been driven into the arms of Miss Greengrass. _That_ was a problem he had never foreseen. He’d hoped, when they first came into contact, that Harry would sway her and perhaps some of her friends, to the light. They could always use more allies, and denying Voldemort potential recruits was perpetually useful. But she’d had the opposite effect, driving Harry towards his more Slytherin tendencies. By the time he’d realised, it had been too late to stop it. The pair had gone to the Yule Ball together. Not something he could easily erase. And Jacob Greengrass was not someone he wanted to annoy.

Thanks to his quick perusal of Harry’s mind, he knew now that Miss Greengrass had been the one to uncover his deception with the Goblins, and she was poisoning his thoughts with revolution. Albus had yet to develop a viable plan to remove her from Harry’s circle of friends. A potion had been an option, but she’d flaunted her House ring to Umbridge before she’d disappeared, and Albus had hastily pulled back.

No. His attention at the moment was on Cultivation’s Ring. The Goblins had introduced a new piece of power onto the global chessboard in unleashing that device. Ragnok surely knew that. He had a plan. Albus _had_ to get the ring from the girl before Harry squandered its power…

The Floo flared again, and Arthur came rushing out, panting and confused.

“Molly? What are you doing? What’s going on? I’m so sorry Headmaster…”

“It’s fine, Arthur,” Albus started, but Molly screamed over him, barrelling into Arthur and shoving the broken spoon into his face.

“Our Ginny… she’s dead!”

Albus hadn’t told anyone in the Order of the Phoenix what Harry had done at Azkaban prison. They knew little more than what Harry himself had announced in the Great Hall. Only Severus knew that it was Ginny Weasley that Harry had rescued, a fact that Albus had ordered be kept from Tom at all costs. He undoubtedly knew the girl’s history, thanks to Lucius, and Albus didn’t want to think what Tom might do to her in revenge. Or in the name of experimentation.

“Dead?” Arthur exclaimed, colour draining from his face, legs starting to wobble.

“I’m sure that’s not the case,” Albus assured them, placing the clock down. “It’s far more likely a malfunction with the clock. Tomorrow, I will take you to Azkaban myself to be sure. Arthur, why don’t we take Molly down to the hospital wing. Poppy can whip up a calming memory in moments.”

Arthur nodded dejectedly and allowed Albus to guide him towards the stairs. As they departed, Albus cast a longing look towards the book on the floor.

He would have to wait. Hopefully, Miss Granger would leave the book inside the manor, and not return it to the school.

Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, Albus Dumbledore underestimated Hermione Granger’s OCD.

The book’s library due date was the next day, and Hermione had never, in her sixteen years of life, returned a book late.

* * *

**_From ‘Harry and Daphne’s List, third generation. This time with input from Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley’_ **

_*Written in Daphne’s elegant hand. Ignore the doodle of Hermione’s head on McGonagall’s body in the margin._

  1. Convince Slytherin to abandon Voldemort.



1a. Question) How?

1b. Answer) Make team ‘Us’ (addendum, come up with better name) more appealing than team Voldemort.

1c. Question) How?

1d. Brainstorm)

_*Hermione:_ What do Slytherins, in general, want more than anything?

_*Daphne:_ Power.

_*Hermione:_ There’s your answer.

_*Daphne:_ I don’t understand.

_*Hermione:_ Slytherins are ambitious by their very nature. At least, they’re supposed to be. To get them on your side, show them where the real power is. Dangle it in front of them, then snatch it away. If I’ve learned anything about You-Know-Who over the past five years, it’s that he doesn’t have a good record of delivering on his promises. Show them something they can have right now, then _give it_ to them.

_*Ron:_ That would work on anyone though, not just Slytherins. It’s like sacrificing a queen or a bishop in chess. The power piece is just too good not to capture, that you miss the rook waiting to attack from behind.

_*Daphne:_ Fuck… You’ve just given me an idea.

_*Now in Hermione’s bunched hand._

1e. A) Like bees to honey :)

* * *

**_Hogwarts, the next morning._ **

Dumbledore was missing when Harry and Daphne entered the Great Hall the next morning. Hermione and Ron were already seated, but neither of them were surprised when the couple walked past the seats Gryffindor House had left for them.

Instead, they sat down with the Hufflepuff fifth years, whom all moved to give them a wide birth. All except Susan Bones.

Harry didn’t know her that well. From what Daphne had told him, she was quite clever but hid her intelligence behind a great deal of insecurity and the pressure to live up to her famous aunt. The most important thing, however, was that Susan and Daphne partnered in Ancient Runes.

“Susan, you aren’t going to believe what I got my hands on this summer,” Daphne said eagerly, in a voice that easily carried across the hall.

Susan, whose spoon of oatmeal was frozen between her bowl and mouth as she stared at them, blinked a few times.

“Umm… what?”

Daphne looked around conspiratorially, a maniacal grin on her face, then pulled a small silver metal rod from her robes; about the size of a wand, engraved with tiny black runes and symbols and tapering to a sharp point.

Daphne held the _stele_ in her hand, spinning it around her fingers.

Susan’s spoon clattered to the table.

“Holy _fuck._ That isn’t…”

“A Cursebreaker’s _stele._ ”

“They’re supposed to be a _myth_.”

Daphne smirked.

“Not so much.”

She tucked the _stele_ away, satisfied enough people at the Slytherin and Ravenclaw tables knew enough about Goblins to recognise the device.

“Daphne’s been teaching me Ancient Runes,” Harry said, taking a piece of toast and buttering it. “She’s an excellent teacher.”

Daphne blushed, kicking him under the table, before resuming her prepared speech.

“I’m going to do that Runes essay tonight. Did you want to do it together? You can borrow…”

“Yes,” Susan said, cutting her off with an enthusiastic wave of the head and wide eyes.

“I’d love to.”

“Cool. You want to ask the others in our class? We can do it as a group study thing.”

Ancient Runes had the lowest number of participants of any class at Hogwarts. Even Arithmancy had more, thanks to the number of muggle-borns who took the course. Daphne and Susan’s class this year only had eight students.

“Sure. In the Library? How about seven-thirty?”

“Excellent.”

Bees to honey indeed.

* * *

**_From ‘Harry and Daphne’s List, third generation. This time with input from Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley’_ **

_*Written in Hermione’s bunched hand. Ignore Harry and Ron’s doodles in the margin, introducing Daphne to ‘emojis’._

  1. Neutralise Ministry Influence. Disinformation? Or, maybe just tell the truth.



2a. Note) This is a common tactic used by revolutionaries throughout history. It would also be effortless to start through Ravenclaw and maybe Gryffindor, in the form of a Hogwarts Newspaper.

2b. Query) Read up on late 70’s American Magical Revolution, maybe contact someone for help?

2c. Note) _*in Ron’s scribbled hand._ The Hogwarts Rumour Mill, gone postal!

2d. Note) _*Stick figure of Hedwig carrying a newspaper, a comic speech bubble overhead, drawn by Harry._ “POTTER!!!!”

2e. Note) _*In Daphne’s elegant hand._ Poor Hedwig :D

* * *

**_Hogwarts, Mid-day_ **

Hermione pushed her way into the Common Room during the lunch break, nose deep within her latest acquisition from the library.

_‘The American Magical Revolution refers to the dissolution of MACUSA – the Magical Congress of the United States – in 1981, after four years of guerrilla and disinformation campaigns undertaken by the terrorist organisation known as the IMA – The Interventionalist Movement of America._

_Though the flashpoint of the ‘revolution’ occurred in May 1977, tensions within the American magical community had been growing for some time. Many American wizards were involved in Grindelwald’s Wizarding War, travelling to Europe to join his campaign, but were not arrested returning to the United States after his defeat. These reactionaries mingled with the general populous, fanning the flames of discontent between MACUSA, which was seen as corrupt, and the general populous._

_Anger and resentment curated significantly by No-Maj born wizards taken from their families under Rappaport’s Law boiled over in 1965. Rappaport’s Law, which forbids any interaction with No-Maj’s, was repealed, and many wizards and witches attended No-Maj Colleges across America as a result._

_The final wand that broke the Hippogriffs back, so to speak, was the No-Maj Vietnam War. Because Rappaport’s Law was repealed, Witches and Wizards became eligible for the Draft, and many were conscripted into the United States Military. MACUSA refused to intervene and protect these individuals – most of them young men – and the Statute of Secrecy forced them not to use magic against their Vietnamese enemies. When veterans of the No-Maj War returned home, harrowed, injured and brutalised by the No-Maj heathens, they were abandoned. A phrase often repeated comes from then MACUSA President Hogan Harold._

_“You made your bed, go die in it.”_

Hermione shivered, frowning at the text. There was something wrong here. Inconsistencies.

_‘The recognised start of the revolution occurred when Richard and Mary Parker, radicalised American Purebloods, deliberately broke the Statute of Secrecy in a suicide attack on the Woolworth Building in New York. The incident was barely covered up but succeeded to embolden radicals across the country. The United States, being large inland area and its population scattered, is difficult to police and regulate. Such attacks occurred frequently and dangerously for the next four years, growing aggressively worse – with higher and higher casualty numbers – until MACUSA, power waning and ignored by the general populous, collapsed. The American No-Maj President, Ronald Reeban, with the aid of the corrupt Magical Federation of the Pacific Islands, took control of the magical population._

_‘This should serve as an example of what can happen if we aren’t vigilant.’_

Hermione rubbed her forehead, then flipped to the back of the book, checking the back cover. A black rubber stamp mark had been pressed there—a large M, with writing around the edges.

_‘This text has been revised to comply with Ministry of Magic standards.’_

Censorship.

The book had been _censored._

_Of course, it had_. Dumbass Wizards. No mention of slavery or _why_ MACUSA had been considered corrupt and inept. And the text itself… It just didn’t line up with what she knew of muggle history. The repeal of Rappaport’s Law must have coincided with the Civil Rights Movement. They’re not a single reference to counter-culture or the Vietnam War protests, which _must_ have involved at least some wizards if they went to American colleges. Perhaps most damming, in all the other history texts she’d read, MACUSA had been considered one of the most right-wing magical regimes. Worse even than the Magical Caliphate. It had clearly been a left-wing group that destroyed it – but there was no reference to Communism or the Soviet Union.

And they’d gotten Ronald Reagan’s name wrong.

It was times like these Hermione wished her parents hadn’t been dentists, as she could really go for something sugary right about now.

“Hermione! Over here!”

Hermione shook out of her morose mood gaze falling on Padma, who was sitting on knees, arms folded across the back of an armchair.

“Come _on._ You’ve been closeted about Harry and the Greengrass girl for _days_. Surely you can tell us _something._ I’m _dying_ over here.”

Parvati and Lavender’s heads appeared over the couch a second later, all three girls adopting pleading expressions.

Well, no time like the present to engage Harry and Daphne’s plan. She could send Hedwig to her parents later and ask them to nose around the American Embassy for anything that looked out of the ordinary. Her mother would enjoy that.

Hermione sighed for effect, and the three girls lit up like Christmas.

“Alright. But this stays between us, okay?”

Yeah, that was never going to happen.

Padma, Parvati and Lavender nodded vigorously anyway.

“Apparently, Harry took Daphne out into muggle London. Gave her the full treatment. Jewellery stores, expensive dresses… apparently she _doubled_ the size of her shoe collection.”

Lavender almost feinted.

“That’s _soooo_ romantic,” Parvati swooned.

“I wish I had a boyfriend like that,” Padma muttered.

Hermione snorted. Every girl deserved a boyfriend like Harry, in her opinion. Unfortunately, they were unlikely to find one. Her essentially in-all-but-blood brother was one hell of a skilled womaniser.

“And it wasn’t easy prying it out of him, even for me,” Hermione continued, “But I finally got him to admit to why he broke into Azkaban.”

The girls all froze. At Daphne’s suggestion, Hermione had adopted an air as though she were speaking her thoughts out loud, forgetting the gossips were there. As much as she hated to admit it, the Slytherin gave good advice on that front.

“He was after _Ginny Weasley_. Apparently, it was his fourth try, and he never told me.”

She huffed indignantly, silently proud of her performance.

Hermione shook herself, turning back to the trio.

“I meant to say, as well. I had an idea over the holidays. Muggle schools have school newspapers, why doesn’t Hogwarts have one?”

Lavender frowned, while the twins – both half-blood – turned thoughtful.

“I mean, you guys would be awesome at something like that. But whatever. Not really my thing. See you later.”

Job done, Hermione turned on her heel and started walking up to her room, attention redirecting back to how she could go about learning more of the American Magical Revolution.

* * *

**_From ‘Harry and Daphne’s List, third generation. This time with input from Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley’_ **

_*Written in Daphne’s elegant hand._

3, revised. Unveil Ginevra Weasley-Black, new Heiress of the House of Black, to the Wizarding World. Begin her appeal process.

3a. Note) _*in Harry’s scrawled hand._ Oh, snap.

* * *

**_Diagon Alley, afternoon..._ **

Corbin Yaxley liked doing his shopping in the evenings.

There was just something about the bustle of Diagon Alley, of witches and wizards moving in and out of shops chattering amongst themselves that electrified the atmosphere. Made everything seem… more real, somehow.

Even Gringotts wasn’t immune, despite the tiny monsters’ best intentions. At all other times of the day, the bank was almost deathly silent, the only conversations between wizards and the goblin tellers. It was only in the hustle of rush hour that the silence was pierced.

So, as Yaxley waited for one of the stupid creatures to bring up his family mithril potion knife – _worth a fortune, but there was no instrument finer –_ it was impossible to notice the instant hush that fell over Gringotts Bank at five thirteen on Thursday evening.

He looked up from his copy of the Daily Prophet – full, he was pleased to see, of his Lord’s disinformation – and found himself staring at a young woman silhouetted by the marble doors. Tall, with a slim, athletic figure and a rather impressive cleavage. Her hair was a fiery red, like magma detonating from a volcano, complemented by slate-grey eyes and a dusting of freckles across porcelain white skin. In fact, Yaxley would say the skin was borderline sickly, the hallmark of a prisoner who hadn’t been out in sunlight for a very long time. She wore an outfit far from traditional wizard wear, but not out of fashion. A black laced bodice sucked in her chest and pushed up her breasts, with deep red flares along the sides and sleeves. Her pants – like a muggle’s – were skin-tight black, meeting knee-length boots with small heels. Meshed gloves, black and red, covered her hands, and a similar shaded scarf hung around her neck. A wizarding cloak, a blackish grey that had the odd property of breaking up the woman’s outline, hung across her shoulders, hood pushed back. A silver pin was visible at her throat – a lightning bolt – and a mangy black hound stood at her heel.

Yaxley focussed on none of this. Instead, his gaze was _fixed_ on her right hand. An armguard, black, like the rest of the ensemble, sat snugly against her wrist. A wand holster. A design he’d seen before; one owned and useable only by a member of the House of Black. The only person he’d ever seen use one was Bellatrix.

Actually, that was a lie. He’d seen one other person use it.

The woman walked up to a teller with a steady gait, dog trailing behind, but, judging by the way her eyes flickered around the room, she was nervous. _‘Woman’_ might have been too generous. No… this was just a girl. But how? And who?

“Good hunting and plunder Master Goblin,” she said in a hesitant voice. Definitely a girl. Seventeen? She couldn’t be younger than sixteen. But if she _was_ a Black… they did grow up early. He’d gone to school with Bellatrix, Sirius, Narcissa, Regulus and Andromeda after all.

“And eternal suffering on your enemies, Miss,” the goblin teller replied, scrutinising the girl just like every other person in the crowded and still silent bank.

“For what do you come to Gringotts this evening?”

“I need certification of lineage, then I would like to speak with Account Master Crackjaw. Thank you.”

The Goblin didn’t acknowledge her at first, taking another look at her attire, then squinting at her face. Come to think of it, the entire outfit was reminiscent of Bellatrix’s in a way.

“Name?”

The girl’s face cracked into a small smile.

“Ginevra Weasley-Black.”

The penny dropped.

A cacophony of screams filled the bank as wizards and witches ran for the door or disapparated on the spot.

Yaxley was long gone by the time Miss Weasley-Black was escorted into the building. His master needed to hear this immediately.

* * *

**_From ‘Harry and Daphne’s List, third generation. This time with input from Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley’_ **

_*addendum notes at bottom of sheet. Multiple hands._

_*Ron:_ This is a great plan and all, but you’re all forgetting something.

_*Harry:_ He’s right. I was going to wait till the end, figured you just hadn’t mentioned it yet.

_*Daphne:_ What?

_*Harry:_ Voldemort.

_*Hermione:_ Shit.

_*Ron:_ Yeah.

_*Note significant stretch of time with no further notes, until Daphne reclaims the pen and draws an arrow from Voldemort’s name to point 4._

  1. _*In Daphne’s elegant hand._ Buy some time.



4a. Query) We need a distraction: something to nock Dumbledore, the Ministry and Malfoy off our backs for a month or two.

4b. Answer) _*In Hermione’s bunched hand._ We already have a brilliant one. _*Hermione draws an arrow to point 3._

4c. Note) _*In Harry’s scrawled hand._ Ginny has to sign off on it first.

_*break_

4d. Answer) She’s in. Says she’s ready to do something. Sirius will take her back to Grimmauld Place tomorrow. There’s something there he wants to show her. Says it will help.

_*Return to bottom of the sheet._

_*Ron:_ You realise… a lot of people could get hurt, right?

_*Daphne:_ The Ministry can’t keep denying everything if there are witnesses and dead bodies to account for.

_*Hermione:_ So we just cross our fingers and hope only people we don’t like, die horrible deaths?

_*Daphne:_ We can control the situation. Make sure the Aurors are on sight, and we were counting on Dumbledore heading straight there anyway. If… if Voldemort tries anything, Dumbledore will be there to stop it.

_*Ron:_ What about us?

_*Daphne:_ We can’t be anywhere _near_ Diagon Alley. Plausible deniability.

_*Ron:_ So we’d be sending Ginny in there on her own? She’s still recovering. She can barely talk!

_*Daphne:_ I said _we_ can’t be there. Sirius can be there in his Animagus form. Andi can be there. So can Mum and Dad and Lupin. She won’t be alone. I wouldn’t send her in there alone.

_*Hermione:_ The goblins will also defend the bank, there’s that… Harry? What do you think?

_*Harry:_ In war… there are casualties. We need to do this. Ginny can take a portkey just in case. If Voldemort or his Death Eaters take the bait, it’ll be just what we need to jumpstart the students coming together.

_*Harry:_ Let’s take it to Sirius and Andi, then call it a night.

* * *

**_Hogwarts, Twilight._ **

“Molly, I assure you I’ll look into this with all due diligence,” Albus assured the distraught woman as he guided the two Weasleys through Hogsmeade and back towards the castle. They’d just returned from Azkaban, delayed by Cornelius, who had decided to ambush him on the island after discovering Albus had departed Hogwarts.

_“Dumbledore! You’re going to turn over that criminal Potter immediately! I have it on good authority that he’s behind Madame Umbridge’s disappearance, and given the evidence surrounding his break-in of this very island, I’m ordering his immediate arrest!!!”_

The Minister was really starting to become a headache.

“But Albus… you don’t think Harry took Ginny from Azkaban, do you?” Arthur asked, a desperate lit to his voice. He was trembling, holding himself and Molly up through force of will alone.

“It’s certainly possible. But even if that was his objective, why refuse to tell any of us? He won’t answer any of my questions and spends all his time in the company of Miss Greengrass. I’m running out of options to get Harry to talk to me. And we still don’t know if your Ginny is dead.”

If only wishing made it so.

Molly burst into a new round of tears, sobbing into Arthur’s jacket.

“Well,” Arthur said, clearing his throat, “I’d like to speak to him. Please.”

Albus nodded.

“Certainly. I’ll arrange for it as soon as we reach the castle.”

Maybe Harry _would_ reveal something to the Weasleys. Something more than just the foolish dreams of teenage rebellion Albus had been able to pull from the boy in his office. Greengrass _must_ have some sort of hidden influence over James and Lily’s boy. Especially given, from his perusal of Harry’s memories, he knew she wasn’t doing anything for him sexually, despite their apparent mutual attraction.

If he could figure out what it was, maybe he could trade the information for Cultivation’s Ring and get back into Harry’s trust at the same time.

As they approached the gates, Albus felt a chill settle over his bones. Minerva was standing there with Severus, both agitated and clearly waiting for his return. Standing tall behind them, was one William Weasley, fang earing and all. He was still in his black and purple Gringotts uniform.

Something had happened.

“Albus! Ginny Weasley…” Minerva began, but Bill cut her off, running past Albus to grab his parents in a vicious hug.

“Mum, Dad… I _saw_ Ginny!”

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

“What? Where!? How!?”

“At Gringotts,” Bill exclaimed, words spilling rapidly from his mouth as Molly seized his collar, big eyes practically pleading. Honestly, Albus couldn’t understand why she cared so much about the girl. She’d let her rot in Azkaban after all, after a bit of Albus’s persuasion.

“She was wearing all black, like the photos of Sirius and Bellatrix from the war, and… and she called herself Ginevra Weasley- _Black_. The goblins took her into the back of the bank before I could get to her. Said she was there for certification of lineage…”

_“CRACK!!!”_

Albus disapparated before the young man could finish his statement.

* * *

**_At the same moment, in Diagon Alley…_ **

Harry stood atop the marble arch of Gringotts Bank, figure obscured by a dark cloak and lower face covered by a red scarf.

Licking his lips, he gripped his wand even tighter. The fight would be with his own wand tonight. Ginny carried his mother’s willow wand. She could shield and disarm – that would have to be enough. Just in case there was an accident with her portkey.

Daphne, Hermione and Ron had agreed they’d needed to stay away from what was coming. They should have known him better.

There was nowhere else in the world Harry would be right now.

Mad-Eye Moody was leaning against the back wall of the Owl Emporium, directly across from the entrance to Knockturn Alley, but well within eye and earshot of Gringotts so he’d know if anyone came from either direction. He’d already spotted Professor Lupin for sure, at Fortescue’s Ice-cream Parlour. Harry didn’t know if the grizzled ex-Auror thought the former werewolf was working for Harry or Dumbledore, but he hadn’t made a move so far. Tonks was here too but hadn’t noticed her mother in the crowd outside Flourish and Blots. They were the only Order Members Harry had spotted so far. He couldn’t imagine what must be keeping Arthur and Molly; surely, they’d be waiting to see their daughter, right?

The Alley was half as full as it had been when Harry had arrived via Knight Bus, just before Sirius and Ginny made their entrance. The other half had vanished in the short chaos following the mass exodus from the bank. Those who remained must have not believed the panicked screams of their brethren, or had simply ignored them.

The real show started when Ginny exited the bank. The second she and Padfoot began their descent from marble stairs to cobblestone, five Death Eaters apparated into the street. They had little to no formation, appearing haphazardly then advancing towards the bank entrance.

No Voldemort.

Harry had guessed right. Snake face wasn’t going to show his face and expose what had to be carefully laid plans, even for a pawn as valuable as Ginny was.

There was only one reason Voldemort would show up.

Harry would have to engage the Death Eaters himself.

Hopefully, he wouldn’t die before Voldemort arrived.


	9. Chapter 9

# Nine

Ginny felt…

She _felt._

That, a pure and raw thought, was lightyears beyond her condition merely days before. Her memories still lingered out of reach. Obscured and hidden, or simply lost to her forever. But she could think. Move her brain from one point to the next without losing her direction. And she could _feel_.

She’d been in pain so long she’d forgotten how it felt not to suffer each moment. Whether from the delusions of her mind or the scars of her body. All the Dementors left her was misery and pain.

But since she’d drunk Sirius’s blood, Ginny’s feelings, her emotions, had been trickling back. She’d made a choice to move on, to rise from the ashes of her past instead of sinking into the abyss of pain and horror she carried within.

Before a mirror in Greengrass Manor, Harry and Ron on one side and Sirius and Daphne on the other, Ginny had started down that path. Putting herself back together, one shattered piece at a time.

The mirror, to Ginny’s mind, was a holy thing. It had shown her exactly who she was. What pieces of the old Ginny had been washed away in joining the House of Black? She didn’t know. Was there anything left of her old self _worth_ keeping?

None of that mattered to her. She had reclaimed, in some small way, with her own two eyes, what she had lost.

She had seen herself.

Vibrant red hair, like the scorching lava of a volcano, complementing pale, freckled skin. She was tall, her bust well-shaped, with what might have been a kind face. Despite her illness, her weakness, she had muscles. The ring had washed away most of the bodily frailty Azkaban had inflicted upon her, replacing it with a subtle definition in her biceps, calves, core and forearms. She was not thin like Daphne, though there was still a frailness about her. A reminder that the Ginny she could see was a creation of her ring’s power and Black Family Magic. If she wished to keep this new Ginny, she would have to work for it. She… she remembered… working. Training. In the gardens at… at her old home. Running around the orchard, sprints in the creek, flying…

Little trickles of emotion, of the feelings she’d thought entirely exorcised, were coming back to her. Ron, _her brother,_ his stories of her life. Of her family. They had helped her fill some small blanks. Why was flying important to her? She could recall a fear of falling, annoyance at her siblings for refusing to do something for her. But when Ron had explained, gently, that the Ginny he’d known had loved to fly on a broom, soaring in the skies without a care in the world, it had come back. The memories had been disjointed and apathetic, without feeling attached, but she had _remembered._ Now, if she focused on them, she could bring to light a sense of delight and thrill—a piece of the real her.

She could build herself back. Sirius would help her. Ron would help her. Sonny would help her. Daphne and her Harry would help her.

That was another emotion she’d become aware of in the past day.

Harry… he made her… feel things. Tingling rushes up and down her entire body. Coursing, rippling, burning. Just looking at him made her sweaty, her skin sensitive and hot. Wonderful things.

He was _her_ Harry.

He cared for her. He had saved her. That must be what love was. The swooping, bottomless feeling of her stomach, the flutter in her breast, the heat on her skin.

She wanted more of it. Watching him stare at her in the mirror wasn’t enough. She wanted more.

And the best way to get more of that rush was to make her Harry happy.

So, she’d agreed to help his plan. No matter how scared she was. Ginny had killed the hag-woman for him, to save him, to protect him.

She could do this.

For Him.

* * *

**_Diagon Alley, Now…_ **

Harry had been right. The moment Ginny and Sirius, in his dog shape, left the bank, five people in Death Eater robes apparated into the street. All had their wands drawn, masks hiding their faces.

The kid was good, but Sirius had never once expected anything less. Harry was James and Lily’s boy to the core. Lily’s immense intelligence and fire merged with James’s whip-crack instincts and natural-born leadership. And Sirius was proud to just play a part in his grand dream of revolution.

If anyone could do it, Harry could.

The Death Eaters rushed forward, pushing through the crowd, raising their wands. Most people hadn’t realised what was happening yet, but Sirius could just make out Mad-Eye, Andi, Nymphadora and Remus all moving as well.

None of them reached their intended targets before Harry entered the fray.

He launched himself from the roof of Gringotts, a figure in swirling black, red scarf obscuring his face, wand flaring with magic in his hand.

The kid had promised not to be anywhere near what was inevitably going to be carnage. Sirius hadn’t believed that for a second.

Harry swung his wand in an arc across the alley as he plummeted towards the ground.

“Glacius Maxima!!!”

A wall of ice, wind and frost blasted forth from Harry’s wand tip, washing over ten metres of the alley in front of him.

The cold spell forced all the civilians in Harry’s immediate vicinity off their feet, where they landed on the now snow-covered ground. Those just further away were blown to the ground by the wind, their clothes instantly frosting over.

Then came the spell-fire. The Death Eaters had all opened fire. Torture spells, stunners and binding spells bitten off with no regard for the crowd or who they’d strike on the way. But Harry’s casting had done its job, and not a single person ended up in the firing line.

The Death Eaters’ spells had all been directed where Harry would land. They hadn’t counted on him rolling into the snow-pile he’d created.

Still in his canine form, Sirius launched himself at Ginny, knocking the girl to the ground then dragging her behind one of the marble columns. She was hyperventilating, face cherry red, eyes frantic. So Sirius gave her a single lick with his tongue, then nudged the Black Family arm-guard on her arm. Lily’s wand was fastened there, retrieved from Godric’s Hollow by Harry himself. Wasn’t that ironic. But there was also a small pendant in the shape of a skull. Not the most fashionable, but Sirius hadn’t had time to change the design when he was rummaging through his cousin’s old things. This ensemble had once belonged to a young Narcissa, and Sirius had managed to resize it to fit Ginny with only a few spells. She certainly looked like a Black in that outfit. Sirius couldn’t wait for Harry to see her in it for the first time. There was a high chance that his Godson would faint.

Ginny nodded, smiling softly as she wiped his canine slobber from her cheek, then grasped the portkey.

An explosion ripped through the street, and Sirius peered out from behind the pillar.

Harry was duelling Lucius Malfoy in the middle of the snow-covered street. And he was _not_ pulling his punches. Reductors, cutting curses, blasting hexes. All of them flew from Harry’s wand, magic alight in the air.

Lucius Malfoy had been a competent dueller in his youth. Nowhere near as good as Sirius, James, Jacob or Bellatrix – who’d been considered extremely top-tier – but still highly capable.

Harry was moping the floor with him.

He was clearly out of practice – sitting in his manor with the Minister as his puppet evidently hadn’t been good for Malfoy’s skill-set – but Sirius’s trained eye didn’t think that was the reasoning for the oncoming defeat.

He had underestimated his opponent and was paying dearly.

Harry blasted the ground beneath Lucius’ feet to smithereens, then cursed a nearby lamppost. The thick, frozen metal came to life and tried to bash Malfoy’s skull in, and Lucius, sliding in the snow as he tried to avoid the crater in the ground, missed it by inches.

“Accio!” Harry shouted, and Lucius, still off-balance, was pulled through the air. Right into Harry’s waiting fist.

It crunched into the man’s gut, and you could hear the breath leaving his lungs across the entire street. He crashed into the ground, and without looking at his defeated opponent, Harry blasted him two inches deep into the road with a single bombarda. 

_Holy fuck._

Beyond Harry’s impressive display, Mad-Eye had successfully disarmed and stunned another Death Eater while Remus duelled another. Mother and daughter, Andi and Dora, were fighting the remaining two. All of them, even Andi, were using non-lethal, Dumbledore approved spells. Just how ineffective it was became all the more evident as Harry dove into the fray. Remus’s opponent was bludgeoned into the wall of Madam Malkin’s with a single banishing charm, while Andi and Dora’s two were both thrown off balance as Harry ripped the ground underneath them into the air.

The best part, in Sirius’s opinion? He did all this with school-level spells. He controlled the ground with a basic Wingardium Leviosa. Not what that spell was at all designed for, but it _worked_. Bombarda, the Exploding Charm, was a fourth-year spell taught to help Witches and Wizards open magically sealed containers or doors. It was banned in official duelling, as, when used against a person, it left intense and very painful magical burns. Of course, few would think to use it anyway, as it was prolonged and easy to deflect spell. Used at close quarters, it was more than capable of disabling an opponent. Permanently. _Accio and Depulso_? The Summoning and Banishing Charms. Both _convenience spells_. Sirius himself had taught Harry how useful they could be in a fight the previous year.

The cold spell started to dissipate, snows melting to water, wind fading away. And Harry took a deep breath to steady himself. Mad-Eye, stunning his downed Death Eater again for good measure after ripping off his mask to reveal Yaxley, fixed his magical eye on Harry…

Then he nodded. Once. A single affirmation of a job well done. Harry responded in kind.

Sirius breathed a sigh of relief as Harry pulled back his hood and scarf, letting the crowd members, pulling themselves up from melting snowdrifts or the corners of buildings where they’d hidden, get a good look at the scar on his forehead.

“It’s Harry Potter.”

“Look, it’s Harry!”

That was all it took. Within seconds, the entire street had taken up the call, crying out Harry’s name in celebration.

Harry waved awkwardly to everyone, scanning faces. He was waiting for something, or looking for someone. Who? Dumbledore?

No. There was something else. Harry’s face was falling into a look of confusion. This wasn’t just about distracting Dumbledore and the Ministry as Harry had suggested to him. Harry had intended something much bigger. But what?

And then he saw it. One of the crowd members, directly behind Harry and hidden from Moody’s Magical Eye, stood just a bit taller than the others. He wasn’t _taller_ than his companions – in fact, the man was rather stumpy looking. But he stood as if everyone were beneath him, and his face did not hold the expression of someone intimidated or relieved at being rescued.

Polyjuice.

Sirius prepared to transform…

* * *

**!Failure!**

**Subject deceased.**

“Damn. I really thought that one would work. Well, the seventh time’s the charm. Reset the loop, and let’s try again.”

“Of course, Master. Granger! _Where’s my fucking hammer, you stupid whore!!!!”_

**Preparing Universe for next attempt…**

**!ERROR!**

**stacktrace compiling…**

**!ERROR(4,12)! External interference detected.**

**patching… patching… patching… patching…**

**Patch complete.**

**Force Injection complete. Commence loop No. 8.**

_*** Harry Potter was not one for sitting on his ass when shit needed doing…._

* * *

“It’s Harry Potter.”

“Look, it’s Harry!”

That was all it took. Within seconds, the entire street had taken up the call, crying out Harry’s name in celebration.

A gloved hand grabbed Sirius’s fur, and he glanced up to see Ginny, still there. She was staring in adoration, wide-eyed and flushed, out at Harry. Sirius honestly couldn’t fault her. Everyone else was.

Harry waved awkwardly to everyone, scanning faces. He was waiting for something, or looking for someone. Who? Dumbledore?

No. There was something else. Harry’s face was falling into a look of confusion. This wasn’t just about distracting Dumbledore and the Ministry as Harry had suggested to him. Harry had intended something much bigger. But what?

And then he saw it. One of the crowd members, directly behind Harry and hidden from Moody’s Magical Eye, stood just a bit taller than the others. He wasn’t _taller_ than his companions – in fact, the man was rather stumpy looking. But he stood as if everyone were beneath him, and his face did not hold the expression of someone intimidated or relieved at being rescued.

Polyjuice.

Ginny shoved Sirius to the side, wand snapping from her holster into her hand. She raised it as Sirius pulled himself upright, and the polyjuiced man stepped forward…

“Expelliarmus!!!”

The red spell blasted from Ginny’s wand like the most powerful firecracker Sirius had ever seen. It rocketed across the street, splintering the still icy air and clearing a path right towards its target. The man reached out, moving to grab Harry by the shoulder. Mad-Eye realised what was coming, bringing his wand up. He would be too slow.

Ginny’s spell careened into the man’s view, and he was forced to dodge to the side. Harry saw it too, spinning in the opposite direction, away from the pudgy man’s outstretched hand.

_‘GET HER OUT OF HERE NOW, SON OF VALOUR!!!!’_

Everything happened so fast. Ginny was recoiling backwards, Sirius was transforming, Mad-Eye had stunning spells in the air, and a clarion voice was screeching into Sirius’s brain.

_‘CRACK!!!!’_

Dumbledore apparated into the middle of Diagon Alley, wand at the ready.

“Accio Harry!”

Harry jerked into the air, flying away from the polyjuiced interloper and towards the Headmaster. Moody’s spells reached the man, who deflected each one with a single wandless hand.

Dumbledore cast Harry behind him, pulling up an overpowered shield as the pudgy man unleashed a tirade of lethal spell-fire. The crowd shrieked and scattered, people running in all directions.

Sirius counted three bodies hitting the ground in the chaos.

“Revelio!!!” Dumbledore commanded.

The pudgy man’s Polyjuice disguise started bubbling away. His skin turned transparent white, and he shot up in height like a beanstalk. The man’s nose melted to slits, eyes burning red—baggy clothes ripping away to reveal robes of pitch black.

Just like that, Lord Voldemort stood opposite Albus Dumbledore in the centre of Diagon Alley.

_‘GO!’_

Sirius finished his transformation, grabbing Ginny in his arms just as more cracks of apparition filled the street. Aurors, Ministry Wizards, Order Members and…

“Ginny!!!”

Sirius caught a single glance of Molly, Arthur and Bill Weasley before he activated the portkey in Ginny’s armguard, and they both vanished.

* * *

**_Hogwarts, Night. About an hour after the attack on Diagon Alley began…_ **

By the time Daphne reached the Hospital Wing, the entire school knew what had happened in Diagon Alley that night.

Lord Voldemort was back. And Harry and Professor Dumbledore had duelled him together, in the middle of Diagon Alley.

Slytherin House, it seemed, had been the last section of the school to find that out. And learning it from Professor Snape as he came to collect Daphne and bring her to see her fiancé in the Hospital Wing? Probably not the best way for them to learn it. Of course, getting to see Draco Malfoy’s face go several interesting shades of purple was always fun, but Daphne wasn’t really in the mood to enjoy it.

Professor Snape was silent the entire walk to the Hospital Wing, and for that, Daphne was grateful. She didn’t need his condescension right now. The hawk-faced man was protective of his Slytherins – both the fledgling terrorists and the normal kids. That being said, since Daphne had gone to the Yule Ball with Harry, she had not been included in that protection. At least he wasn’t outright hostile to her like he was to Harry and Hermione.

“Harry?” Daphne called as the heavy doors swung open. The sun was long beneath the horizon by now, light in the hospital wing coming from dozens of overhead candles.

“Here, Daph.”

Harry was sitting on one of the beds, shirtless, as Madame Pomfrey scraped a yellow paste around a wound on his chest. Was that… There was a shard of _concrete_ sticking out of Harry’s gut.

“Oh my Merlin, what did you do?!”

Harry grinned at her as she raced to his side, heart pounding in her ears.

“Oh, the usual. Fought a dark wizard. Saved some people. Looked cool doing it.”

Daphne slapped him across the face, then pulled him into a hug as well as she could without getting in the matron’s way.

“I’m okay. Really,” Harry started, but Daphne clamped a hand over his mouth and looked to Madame Pomfrey. Her face was covered in firm and disapproving lines, but she nodded in affirmation.

“Give me a minute to get this out, and all he’ll need is a pepper-up and a regrowth potion. I’ll keep him here over-night, but he’ll be fine by morning.”

Daphne swallowed and breathed a sigh.

“What happened?”

“Well,” Harry started, following Professor Snape’s movements as he walked to the other side of the room.

“Voldemort polyjuiced himself. Didn’t see him coming. If not for Professor Dumbledore…” Harry trailed off, still looking at Snape. Daphne followed his gaze and realised with a gasp of horror that the Headmaster was lying on the other bed, unconscious. His entire right arm was burnt black, and a half dozen puncture wounds covered his torso and legs.

“We fought him together while the Aurors got the civilians out of there, and the Order secured the Death Eaters. Gave as good as we got. I hit him with a blasting curse right to face. He was _not_ happy.”

“It was all over in five minutes, though,” Harry said through gritted teeth as Madame Pomfrey yanked the concrete from his side.

“I think he realised we’d played him after Mad-Eye and Remus grabbed Lucius and disapparated because he kept getting angrier. Using more area of effect spells and Killing Curses, then the flashy and finessed stuff he started with. Dumbledore caught the wrong end of a Parseltongue spell I didn’t understand, and he used the distraction to blow up the _entire fucking street_.”

Daphne clutched Harry’s arm tighter as he drank the offered potions. Before her eyes, the wound started knitting back together.

“We were buried in the debris. Kingsley and the Ministry Aurors had to clear the stuff away before we could get out. Dumbledore made a big fuss about getting back to Hogwarts, then brought us back here and passed out. I had to drag him here.”

He sighed softly, then closed his eyes and pressed his head into Daphne’s chest.

“We won’t know the final tally any time soon, but… only seven dead, I think. So that’s something.”

Daphne held him close, humming a lullaby under her breath as he drifted off to sleep. Professor Snape left a short time later, ladened with potions. She supposed he was going to report to Voldemort and heal him.

Madame Pomfrey didn’t try to remove Daphne from the Hospital Wing, thankfully. After ensuring Harry was asleep and healing, she dismissed them both and instead focussed on helping the Headmaster. It took several hours before he looked even remotely okay to Daphne’s eye, but at around midnight, a very tired looking Madame Pomfrey packed up her equipment and had two House Elves move Dumbledore to his rooms. She then went into her office, grabbed a rolled sleeping bag and pillow, and trundled through the Floo.

Daphne didn’t see her again.

* * *

**_The next morning…_ **

Daphne flickered awake as the echo of early morning birdsong filtered through the Hospital Wing. The sun wasn’t up yet. Instead, the castle was caught in the odd ambience of pre-dawn on a Saturday morning. A peaceful and raw kind of tranquillity.

Daphne’s head had ended up tucked beneath Harry’s chin during the night, his arms wrapped tight around her. One of his hands had settled over her right breast, the pads of his fingers rubbing the nipple through the fabric of her shirt. This was not what had woken Daphne up.

That would be Harry’s penis, which was currently pressed against Daphne’s butt.

Snuggled together as they were on top of the blankets, Harry’s length had tented the boxer shorts he’d fallen asleep in and was now sitting snuggly in the crack between Daphne’s cheeks.

Still, in the throes of sleep, mind not really functioning yet, Daphne’s body shivered at the pressure, inadvertently rubbing the engorged flesh. Harry groaned in his sleep, squeezing Daphne’s breast and shifting his hips. His length slid lower, gliding right across her asshole, and Daphne jerked to full wakefulness, squeaking softly.

She glanced around the room, heart surely pounding loud enough for the entire castle to hear. But there was no light on in Madame Pomfrey’s office, and Professor Dumbledore’s bed from the previous night was still empty and messed up. It hadn’t been cleaned yet.

Initial spike of fear abating, Daphne hesitantly took stock of her situation.

One: She was in bed with her fiancé, whom she was head over heels for and only had to speak most days to turn her on.

Two: Daphne had never so much as _dreamed_ of having sex before she was married, let alone sleep _with_ _a man._ Her mother had taken her aside in the most awkward conversation ever before she’d gone to Hogwarts and taught her exactly how to pleasure herself and control her libido so that exact thing didn’t happen.

Three: Her cunt had slickened in under a minute of unintentional stimulation, and was literally throbbing with every slight movement of the member pressed against her ass.

Four: There was no way she could get up without Harry waking.

Five: She really didn’t _want_ him to wake up.

Daphne was still wearing her clothes from the previous evening. The tight shorts and woollen shirt she usually slept in at school. Of course, there was currently a wet-patch growing rapidly in those shorts.

Had Daphne been thinking straight, she would never have done what she did next.

But between the fog of sleep, her lingering fear from the previous night, and how seriously horny she was, Daphne _was not_ thinking straight.

Which was why, instead of awkwardly extricating herself from Harry’s arms and hoping he didn’t wake up, she reached into the waistband of her panties and pressed a cold finger against her clit.

The poor nub was already pulsing and desperate, now given the stimulation it begged for, a jolt of electrical euphoria jumped through Daphne’s nerve endings. She mewled like a cat into the empty hospital wing, body involuntarily pressing back against Harry and rubbing against his fabric bound member.

With featherlight touches and the slowest of movements, Daphne ground her ass against Harry as she expertly rubbed her clit into a frenzy of heat.

As pent up as she was, it did not take long for her to cum. Violently, her entire body trembling, breath coming in tiny gasps, she was confident she’d wake Harry up and have to face the shame of it. But Harry didn’t wake, and Daphne, gripped in that post-orgasmic bliss and the warmth of Harry’s shirtless body pressed against hers, fell back to sleep.

When she woke again hours later, Harry had retreated to the Hospital showers. Daphne’s gaze, however, quickly settled on the side-table. A small flask containing a thick white liquid had been placed there, a note with Madame Pomfrey’s handwriting atop it.

_‘Please use this next time.’_

The bottle’s label said, cleanly and clearly, _Teen Contraceptive Potion – for Young Brides._

Daphne was utterly mortified.

Especially when she realised her hand was still down her pants, and her fluids had leaked onto the sheets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Authors Notes: Poor Harry. Boy must have woken up with some serious blue-balls.
> 
> The next chapter will feature a time-skip, kicking the plot into high gear, and we’ll see if Daphne admits to Harry what she did.


End file.
